Jordan Ruimy: Chloe Zhao‘s Nomadland, Francis Lee‘s Ammonite, Steve McQueen‘s Small Axe anthology and Gianfranco Rosi‘s Notturno seem to be the hotties of this fall festival season.
HE: Five and a half months ago I wrote that Ammonite sounds like Portrait of a Woman on Fire, Part II. Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan are powerhouse, of course, but I still feel vaguely underwhelmed.
Ruimy: You know about Notturno?
HE: Sal Notturno, the Brooklyn pizza chain guy?
Ruimy: Hah, no. Copy reads “shot over the course of three years between Syria, Iraq, Kurdistan, and Lebanon, Notturno follows different people from near war zones in the Middle East, trying to start again with their everyday lives.”
HE: What a shitty year this has been so far.
Ruimy: Not just a shitty year but also a cataclysmically bad one for the future of the industry.
HE: Feels like the end of the world. Like everything is crumbling.
Ruimy: Regina King‘s One Night in Miami was added to Venice today. Based on a play by Kemp Powers, pic tells a fictionalized account of an actual February 1964 meeting that happened in a Miami Beach hotel room between Cassius Clay, Malcolm X, Jim Brown and Sam Cooke, as the group celebrates Clay’s surprise title win over Sonny Liston. Wiki insert: Two days after the 2.25.64 fight Clay announced that he’d joined the “Black Muslims” and adopted the name “Cassius X.” In March 1964 he was renamed Muhammad Ali by Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad.
HE: That’s the only title that turns me on. It’ll rise or fall depending on Eli Goree‘s performance as Clay and Kingsley Ben Adir‘s as Malcolm X. And on the writing, of course.
Ruimy: And then there’s Mona Fastvold and Casey Affleck‘s The World To Come TIFF was afraid to touch it due to Affleck’s involvement, but it’ll play Venice.
HE: Affleck is the new Polanski?

Deadline‘s Mike Fleming is reporting that Netflix is looking to buy Joe Wright‘s long-delayed The Woman in the Window from Disney/Fox. For months word around the campfire has been that this claustrophobic psychological nail-biter with Amy Adams, Julianne Moore, Gary Oldman, Anthony Mackie, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Tracy Letts is a “problem” movie. It’s been delayed and fiddled with and bumped again and finally taken off the schedule entirely due to COVID but mainly because it’s not very good, or so everyone says.

JFK would have had to present himself as a tough Cold Warrior in the ‘64 presidential race against Barry Goldwater. And after winning he’d find it difficult to disengage from Vietnam with the hawks breathing down his neck. He might withdraw or he might not, but if he began a phased withdrawal he’d have to take the blame for America demonstrating weakness and lack of resolve in standing up to Asian communism.

He’d eventually push through the Civil Rights bill and perhaps also the Voting Rights Act, but would he be as aggressive as Johnson was in establishing various liberal domestic programs? Dylan, the Beatles and the British Invasion, Stokely Carmichael, the Black Panthers, the New Left and the counter-culture would happen either way, and all this would manifest in a need for pitched conflict with a senior establishment figure, and who better than the President?

It wouldn’t be easy or pretty or without conflict. Then again strange detours might’ve happened. JFK might have quietly dropped a tab of mellow Orange Wedge (provided by Timothy Leary) during June of ’67 while listening to “Sgt. Pepper” on headphones. But 14 months later he’d have to grapple with Mayor Richard Daley‘s Chicago police riot during the Democratic National Convention in August ’68. And then — horror of horrors — his old nemesis Richard Nixon would return to run against JFK’s Democratic successor, his brother Bobby, only for the dynasty to collapse following the malice of Sirhan Sirhan.

The worst part is that JFK’s second and final term would end in January ‘69, right in the thick of late ‘60s chaos and upheaval and a spreading miasma of social disorder (SDS, Weathermen, tear gas in Harvard Square) and with Nixon victorious. What a terrible finale for an administration that began on 1.20.61 with so much hope and vigor.

Just as Abraham Lincoln’s murder saved him from the fierce conflicts of the Reconstruction era that led to Andrew Johnson’s impeachment, JFK’s death in Dallas saved him from the chaos and conflict of the mid to late ‘60s. [Originally posted this morning as a comment under “Obviously Time Travel“.]

Yesterday (8.2) I was slammed by some extra-sensitive readers for writing the following in my “Bad Ellen Vibes” piece:

“My attitude is that if you’re unlucky enough to be working for a difficult, bullying boss or supervisor, or one who could certainly stand to improve his/her people skills…if you’re in a bad situation like this you need to suck it in, man up and accept this unfortunate energy as the price of working on a popular TV show. You’re there to get paid and forge relationships and move ahead with your career. Hang tough, keep your head down, do the job, and land a better job when the opportunity arises.”

Today a “Page Six” story by Eileen Reslen quoted a 3.20.20 tweet by TV writer Ben Simeon, to wit:

“A new staff member was told ‘every day [Ellen DeGeneres] picks someone different to really hate. It’s not your fault, just suck it up for the day and she’ll be mean to someone else the next day. They didn’t believe it but it ended up being entirely true.”

I really do think that the HE comment-threaders who put me down yesterday need to apologize, preferably sooner rather than later.

I respect stunt professionals, and certainly admire their agility and bravery. But the only stunts that really make the grade are those that don’t look like stunts. The ones that look sloppy and accidental, I mean. The more skillfully “performed” a stunt is, the less believable it is. The stunts in Paul Feig‘s 2016 Ghostbusters exemplify this “fine but who cares?” aesthetic.

And forget car stunts. I know it’s extremely difficult to roll a car or drive it off a seaside pier or whatever, but flashy car stunts have been happening in action films for over a half-century now. The birth of serious stunt driving began 52 years ago with Peter Yates‘ Bullitt. I can’t even watch them any more.

What made Steve McQueen‘s Bullitt car chase through the hills of San Francisco seem so exciting and realistic? The sounds, for one thing — the roar of the muffler-free engines, the crashing sounds when the car chasses slammed into pavement after leaping through the air. Not to mention those metal hubcaps that kept flying off the tires of the bad-guy car. There must have been similar car chases in action films in which the hubcaps went flying, but I can’t recall a single one.

Democratic Presidential nominee Joe Biden has wimped out and dropped the ball as far as picking his vice-presidential nominee is concerned.

The Washington Post is reporting that Uncle Joe has announced a two-week delay in naming the woman who will become his running mate.

Translation: “Man, it’s hard making a final decision plus there’s all this back-and-forth shit going on between reps of the contenders and in the media. I’ve had several months to figure this out but now I need a little more time. Maybe it’ll be easier if I delay my decision for a couple of weeks. I can only repeat that it’s hard, man…really hard to finally decide. Just ask the Lovin’ Spoonful.”

Biden recently said he’d name his pick sometime this week, which everyone presumed would be either today, tomorrow or Wednesday.

The alleged reason is that “the process has become a mess that has pitted women against woman.” So? Ambitious contenders gonna diss the competition. Politics is a rough-and-tumble profession. The point is that Biden needed to man up and make a call, and unfortunately this morning he revealed that he’s found this choosing thing to be too much of a headache. Better to kick the can down the street and hope that matters soon clarify

The Washington Post has reported that Biden supporters feel that the process has become “messier than it should be,” pitting women — and especially black women — against one another.” Biden’s solution: Prolonging the process by two weeks so things can get even messier.

HE to Biden: You can’t stop human nature, Joe. Just man up and make the call. Kicking the can down the street is for candy-asses.

The delay indicates there is no clear favorite among Biden or his allies to be his running mate. Translation: Biden probably likes Harris the most but she has enemies talking her down (i.e., “too ambitious”) and so he’s waffling and dithering.

I can actually do a pretty good imitation of Dylan singing this…”it’s a choice that we’re makin’….we’re saaaaavin‘ our own lives!…it’s true we make a better day, just you and me!” Nothing wrong with Dylan taking part 37 years ago, but a low point nonetheless. Dylan doesn’t “sing” — he nasal-croons.

Because time travel is a passport to all kinds of excitement and adventure and God-knows-what-else, not to mention opportunity and great wealth.

Would I visit Dealey Plaza on the morning of 11.22.63? Yes, but not to alter history. In his novel and miniseries “11/22/63”, King has suggested what a screwed-up, tangled-up cosmic malfunction would result if anyone tried, so let’s leave it there.

Instead I would become the photographer and documentarian who removes all ambiguity.

I would get hold of three 16mm color cameras with long-lasting magazines and professional-class zoom lenses along with some first-rate Hasselblad still cameras, and hire a couple of assistants.

I would then (a) find a good vantage point and film Oswald (or whomever) shooting from the sixth-floor window. I’d also (b) film whatever actually happened (or not) behind the wooden grassy knoll fence. And most importantly I’d (c) capture some first-rate MCU color footage of JFK and John Connolly as the shots ring out.

Posted on 10.3.10: In Secretariat (Disney, 10.8), Diane Lane gives an earnest, steady-as-she-goes performance as Penny Tweedy, the conservative housewife who risked financial ruin and defied her husband (Dylan Walsh) and brother (Dylan Baker), who wanted to sell their inherited horse farm for a quick profit, in order to nurture, train and place into competition one of the most celebrated racehorses in history.

The horse was initially named Big Red but eventually became Secretariat — legendary winner of the 1973 Triple Crown. And it’s a thrill to watch (and hear) him run. The film sometimes gives you that amazing charge with exceptional you-are-there photography and sound. But Secretariat is as rote and regimented and corny as Kansas in August, and I don’t see it selling many tickets beyond its base constituency — squares, tourists and hardcore horse-racing fans.

In short, I loved the story of Secretariat more than the movie. Actually, not the story so much as the horse-racing footage. The problem (and the movie has more than one) is that director Randall Wallace uses every trick in the book to make it seem touching, suspenseful, a cliffhanger…a story that massages your heart. Every. Trick. In. The. Book. And you’re not “in” the groove of Secretariat as much as fully aware of everything he’s trying to do to crank you up. You never forget you’re watching a Randall Wallace family-values movie for the schmoes — i.e., white people who stroll around in plaid shorts and white socks and La Crosse golf shirts, and who have an allegiance for old-fashioned Wonder Bread conservatism.

Everything is so right down the middle. And for me, Wallace’s directing style is too tight and straight-laced. There’s a little cut-loose dance sequence when Lane and her team are shown bopping and grooving to a ’70s soul tune, but Wallace doesn’t know how to cut and bump to this kind of thing, or at least not very well. Nor is he especially good at depicting early ’70s counter-culture kids and their behavior. It feels fake, “performed” — like some 1971 Methodist minister’s view of how hippie kids dressed and spoke and acted.

Lane has three moments that play exceptionally — (a) an argument/firing scene with a horse-farm manager in the first act, (b) a moment when she looks into the eyes of Secretariat to see if he’s ready to run, and (c) a financial face-off scene between she, Walsh and Baker. Except the latter scene is brought home by the housekeeper (Margo Martindale) when she spells out the specifics of their father’s will. A solid award-worthy performance needs three powerful moments, not two and a half. Lane’s performance wants to be as good as Sandra Bullock‘s in The Blind Side, but doesn’t quite get there. Sorry.

And Mike Rich‘s script doesn’t really give her any huge killer moments. Solid moments, but not great ones. The staring-at-Secretariat moment might be the best of all. Lane has a hold on the heart and spirit and determination that surely drove her character forward. Nice lady and mildly hot under the circumstances. But why did that wig she was wearing have to look so much like a wig? Don’t hairdressers know how to make wigs a little mussy and more natural-looking?

I quickly lost patience with Scott Glenn, who plays Lane’s ailing dad. Alzheimer’s, a stroke….die, you fucking boring actor!

I’ve been disregarding the Ellen DeGeneres brouhaha about all the complaints about her being a mean boss and the toxic environment among staffers for her daily talk show.

I was also suspicious of that recent Daily Mail report about former staffers accusing Ellen of “turning a blind eye” to rampant sexual misconduct by senior-level producers, etc. As well as a claim that DeGeneres is telling executives at Telepictures and Warner Bros that “she has had enough and wants to walk away from the show”, and that “she feels she can’t go on and the only way to recover her personal brand from this is to shut down the show.”

Today, however, The Sun‘s Emma Parry and James Desborough reported that James Corden is in line to replace Degeneres. So maybe there’s something to it.

This presumably all stems from the “safeties” (i.e., sensitive, mostly Millennial-aged staffers) complaining about the usual usual.

My attitude is that if you’re unlucky enough to be working for a difficult, bullying boss or supervisor, or one who could certainly stand to improve his/her people skills…if you’re in a bad situation like this you need to suck it in, man up and accept this unfortunate energy as the price of working on a popular TV show. You’re there to get paid and forge relationships and move ahead with your career. Hang tough, keep your head down, do the job, and land a better job when the opportunity arises.

I realize, of course, that this is not the prevailing attitude these days. But I can’t help but note the irony about all this complaining having possibly led to DeGeneres walking away from the show, which translates into all her complaining staffers suddenly being without income. On 8.1. a Daily Mail story reported that Ellen’s production staffers are “freaking out over fears she will quit or be cancelled after some employees complained of a toxic atmosphere on set,” etc.

Gee, guys…I guess that’s a possibility when workplace complaints reach a certain fever pitch or tipping point. Maybe you should’ve adopted the HE attitude and not complained quite so much in the first place? Just a thought.

All my moviegoing life I’ve been more or less avoiding Frank Capra‘s Mr. Smith Goes To Washington (’39). A highly respected political dramedy about idealism vs. corruption, of course. One of Capra’s finest films, they all say. And one of the standouts of 1939, which has long been celebrated as old-time Hollywood’s greatest year.

But we all know that Capra lays it on too thick. And so my thinking was, “Okay, I’ll see it eventually but I’m in no hurry.” I began telling myself this back in the ’70s, and I somehow managed to sidestep Mr. Smith all through the Nixon, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush and Obama administrations, and over the last three and a half years of Trump. But a 4K Bluray version was part of a Sony package I bought a while back, and last night I decided to pop it in.

HE verdict: Mr. Smith is a “good” film in that it says the right populist things about governmental corruption (i.e., established stinky politicians need to consider the views of a true-blue idealist every so often), and it does so with crackerjack dialogue (written by Sidney Buchman and Myles Connolly) and lots of snappy attitude and sweaty passion, and you can see how and why it made Jimmy Stewart (between 30 and 31 when it was shot) a major star.

But my God, it wears you down! I felt exhausted after 45 minutes, and I had another 80 minutes to go. By the time it ended I felt all but poisoned by the sugar and the Capracorn syrup. And it felt so fake and cranked up…a big bowl of patriotic whipped cream with sentimental sauce and a cherry on top.

Has anyone in the history of the planet earth every been as naive and idealistic as Stewart’s Jefferson Smith? How could the son of a man who was friendly with Claude Rains‘ Senator Joseph Paine for so many years possibly be this clueless about the ways of the grown-up world?

Why in heaven’s name would Jean Arthur, who’s obviously class-A material and who seems destined to end up as Smith’s girlfriend or wife…why would she even flirt with the idea of marrying Thomas Mitchell‘s cynical Capitol Hill reporter? She and Mitchell were drunk when the idea arose, yes, but it makes no sense — nobody ever marries Thomas Mitchell, and flirting with this degraded Arthur’s value.

And after Stewart collapses on the Senate floor, the guilt-wracked Rains/Paine runs out and tries to shoot himself? Where did the gun come from? And Harry Carey, the president of the Senate (which makes him FDR’s vp), is the only person in the Senate chamber who sympathizes with Stewart’s plight?

I’m glad I finally saw Mr. Smith Goes To Washington. I’m not calling it a bad film but it’s certainly an exhausting one. I will never, ever see it again. And I’m saying this as a fan of It’s A Wonderful Life, which I’ve seen at least six or seven times.