Where can this guy possibly go in life, given the perverse tomb that he lives in, like a living mummy inside an ancient Egyptian pyramid, and his apparent inability to leave it, step out and renew, re-engage, reinvent himself. He’s Miss Havisham from Great Expectations — bloated, diseased and malignant beyond the darkest imaginings of Edgar Allen Poe, much less Charles Dickens.
Steven Soderbergh‘s Che is off to a strong start at Manhattan’s Ziegfeld and L.A.’s Westside Pavillion, I’m told. In LA the entire weekend was sold out before the first show started, and the big Ziegfeld show (i.e., both films plus intermission) sold out an an hour in advance. People cheered during the Ziegfeld intermission. When Soderbergh dropped by for a q & a, he got a standing ovation. He spoke for about 40 minutes, and almost everyone stayed.
What Doesn’t Kill You director-writer Brian Goodman invited me to a post-screening soiree last night at Almond, a noisy, reasonably priced restaurant on West 22nd near Broadway. By the time everyone arrived around 9:45 or so the news had broken about Bob Yari , the producer-distributor of Goodman’s film, having gone into Chapter 11.
This is bad news for WDKY, which is only just starting to be seen and talked about, and for Rod Lurie‘s Nothing But The Truth , a Yari movie that’s also been caught with its pants down. It would be one thing if they both blew chunks, but they’re well-written, high-calibre tweeners with award-quality performances. Tough deal.
I broke the news to Goodman when he came in, showed him the story on my iPhone. It kind of took the energy down until WDKY star Ethan Hawke showed up and then it was a “hey!” environment again. Hawke and Goodman and three or four others were playing pool on a fair-sized table with a brown-felt top. Goodman, it should be noted, is a very accomplished player. Not Eddie Felson level, but he made 70% or 80% of his shots.
The American public will hand over roughly $31,524,000 to the makers of The Day The Earth Stood Still this weekend. The second place Four Christmases will make $12,234,000 for a cume of $86,900,000.
The third-place Twilight will take in $7,334,000 — $149,129,000 as of Sunday night.
And the fourth-place Bolt will take in $6,946,000
Nothing Like the Holidays, the Hispanic holiday comedy, bombed with a projected total of $4,035,000 and $2400 a theatre. Baz Luhrman‘s Australia will earn $3,865,000 — now to about $37 million domestic. Madagascar will follow with $2,879,000.
The only limited opener that looks like it has legs is Clint Eastwood‘s Gran Torino, which will take in $268,000 at six situations and about $44,000 per theatre. The best limited starter is Doubt — opened in 15 runs, 32,000 per screen, $492,000 by Sunday night. That’s actually fairly decent.
Gus Van Sant‘s Milk will do just fair after expanding to 330 runs — it’s projected to earn $2,539,000 and $7700 a print. Issue-driven political drama, gay-themed story, etc. I lost the figure for Quantum of Solace but I know it’s expected to come in slightly under the Milk figure.
Slumdog Millionaire expanded to 169 runs, having dded 91 theatres — it’s projected to take in $2,067,000 and $12,000 a print. Okay, not sensational. Frost/Nixon went from 3 runs to 30 runs, $15,000 a print, $605,000 for the weekend — okay, not wonderful. Doubt opened in 15 runs, 32,000 per screen, $492,000 by Sunday night.
The animated Delgo is projected to earn $400,000 — 2300 theatres,.$185 per theatre.
The Reader is playing in 8 situations and is projected to earn $165,000 or about $28,000 a print.
Asked what he thinks the Obama administration “will do about Cuba,” Che director Steven Soderbergh tells Politico‘s Jeffrey Ressner the following:
“What they ought to do is really obvious. Whether they’ll do it is one of these questions in which you have a lot of people with certain beliefs controlling the dialogue, and therefore the problem is not getting solved.
“How many years are you supposed to give a bad idea? Would you stay married for 45 years to someone you hated? It’s obvious what we’re doing isn’t working. The answer is [to] lift the embargo and flood that place with tourists, put the onus on them and call their bluff. The people of the U.S. are the best advertisement for its ideals — not its government.”
The absence of a comma between the words “bad” and “can” drove me up the wall the minute I had a look at the Good poster last night. I’m convinced that movie advertising people enjoy running copy that ignores basic punctuation because they know it irritates people like me. I think it gives them a little perverse kick. Seriously.
What Doesn’t Kill You director-writer-actor Brian Goodman on Prince and Lafayette — Friday, 12.12, 4:35 pm. After shooting pics we went upstairs to a friend’s office and did a half-hour interview. An excellent fellow all around — candid, a humanist, unaffected, no bull. Relatively few guys with hard-knocks experience within the criminal world have gone on to a life of writing and entertainment, but Goodman’s a member in good standing.
The career of Van Johnson, whose death was reported earlier today, peaked in the ’40s and ’50s. I never much liked his country-hick accent (he came from Rhode Island) and particularly the way he repeatedly groaned “ohhh, no!” in William Wellman ‘s Battleground (’49). But I’ve been watching that film all my life so Johnson obviously wasn’t that alienating. I’ll always remember his grim- faced Lieutenant Stephen Maryk in The Caine Mutiny (’54), and the pilot he played in Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (’44). He lived for 92 years, which is a pretty good long run. He was allegedly closeted.
Arizona Daily Star critic Phil Villarreal says “no Che screeners or screenings (that I know of) were set for the Phoenix Film Critics Society. Same for Nothing but the Truth. Voting deadline is today.”
“Why not go the Full Monty and have Hugh Jackman host the Oscar telecast as Wolverine, with other super-heroes as presenters? That would be worth the price of admission.” — posted at 11:409 Pacific by Rich S.
Of all the Nazi-slash-Holocaust movies that have screened or opened over the last few weeks, I was surprised to discover that Vicente Amorim‘s Good (Thinkfilm, 12.31), an adaptation of C.P. Taylor’s play with Viggo Mortensen and Jason Isaacs in the lead roles, is the best of the lot. More satisfying than The Reader, slightly more engaging than Valkyrie, more period-believable than The Boy in Striped Pajamas, more emotionally affecting than Adam Resurrected.
I braved pouring rains last night in order to attend Good’s New York premiere at the Museum of Jewish Heritage, 36 Battery Place (between 1st Place and West Street). Mortensen, Issacs (who also executive produced) and Amorim were interviewed on-stage by film scholar Annette Insdorf .