Remember that Sylvester Stallone didn’t insult any Tulsa King background people to their face. Nor did he share his reportedly unkind comments with various people on the Atlanta-based set.

According to Variety’s Kate Aurthur, Stallone shared said opinions only with director Craig Zisk, privately. The unspecified remarks made their way to Facebook via a second-hand eavesdropping — an overheard conversation that was passed along.

Is Stallone an elderly Republican tough guy who doesn’t adhere to woke social standards? Yes. Did he share views about allegedly unattractive extras that certain parties found offensive? Apparently. Should Stallone henceforth strive to share less ruthless opinions about the appearance of this or that coworker? Yeah, he should.

Friendo: “So Civil War is woke-infused propaganda masquerading as neutral drama. And the only ones calling it ‘even handed’ are likely woke as fuck. Correct?”

HE: Mostly correct, yes, although it’s not really “woke-infused propaganda,” although it could be so argued in certain respects.

My first major thought upon leaving the theatre last night was that the lying–by–omission on the part of many if not most of the South by Southwest critics is fairly shocking. Some of those bastards flat–out lied through their teeth.

What the final third of Civil War boils down to is an anti-Trump and anti-MAGA jeremiad. The finale of Alex Garland’s dystopian war film really hates with a capital H, and you can’t help but admire it for not softening the tone or diluting the rage. Call it morally ironic if you want…I don’t care.

The ending is so arousing that I almost experienced a boner.

Apart from a curious, less-than-involving focus upon the two leading photo-journalist characters (Kirsten Dunst’s hard-bitten veteran and Cailee Spaeny’s young and emotionally-driven pup), the first two-thirds seem to be mostly even-handed and matter-of-fact in a Battle of Algiers way.

But when the already notorious Jesse Plemons scene (around the 60 or 65-minute mark) arrives, and especially when the big finale happens, it totally becomes a “hooray and goo-rah for the lefty rebels!” thing, and that’s all there is to it.

Okay, you can argue “but it’s full of tragedy and irony and horrible devastation so how can you call it a ‘hooray for the lefties!’ thing?” Yes, it is rife with somber, morally ambiguous irony, but Civil War certainly reveals its true colors at the end.

It also shows a certain significant character to be a weeping, whimpering coward, and I for one think it’s truly wonderful for this.

“Yes, there’s still a long way to go, and [there’ll be almost certainly] more horrendous shit to endure over the coming few years. But I genuinely believe we’ve seen the worst of it. In fact, I would say the scale of change has been quite abrupt.

“Something like Disney’s Strange World, released just over a year ago, would probably not be greenlit, produced or released today….”

…when I brought it over two weeks ago.

Last night I watched episodes #6 and #7 of Steven Zallian’s Ripley, and what a soothing, transporting dream trip this series is…a silky and serene monochrome soul bath…a reminder of how much better life was and still is over there in certain pockets, and (this is me talking and comparing, having visited Italy six or seven times) what an ugly and soul-less corporate shopping-mall so much of the U.S. has become this century…the contrasts are devastating.

Ripley is an eight-episode reminder that there really is (or was during the mid-20th Century) a satori kind of life to be found in parts of Italy and Sicily, better by way of simplicity and contemplation and quiet street cafes, better via centuries of tradition, pastoral beauty and sublime Italian architecture…grand romantic capturings of Napoli, Atrani (the same historic Amalfi Coast city where significant portions of Antoine Fuqua’s The Equalizer 3 were shot), Palermo, Venezia and Roma.

Life doesn’t have to be dreary and banal and soul-stifling, Zallian is telling us in part…you can find happiness standing downstream, as the great Jimi Hendrix once wrote, especially if you’re an elusive sociopath living on a dead guy’s trust-fund income and therefore not obliged to toil away at some sweaty, shitty-ass job to survive.

This Chanel Iconic Handbag spot is a tribute to Claude Lelouch‘s A Man and a Woman (’66). The dreamy mood, the black-and-white cinematography (although the original was shot in monochrome, sepia and color), Francis Lai‘s famous musical theme.

The stars of that 58-year-old romantic classic, Jean Louis Trintignant and Anouk Aimee, were in their early-to-mid 30s when it was shot in ’65. Today’s Chanel costars, Brad Pitt and Penelope Cruz, are significantly older (60 and 49 respectively) and so the directors, Inez and Vinoodh, have digitally de-aged them.

I get the idea, of course, but Pitt doesn’t look like a 30something — he looks like a late 50something whose face has been almost totally erased, certainly of character. I like the slightly weathered, crinkly-eyed guy he played in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood better.

The tall waitress (5’10”) is Dutch fashion model Rianne Van Rompaey.

I just read a 3.25.24 article titled “Stop Laughing at Old Movies — audiences behaving badly at the theater, concerts, and everywhere else.”

The author is Jessica Crispin, who runs a Substack blog called “The Culture We Deserve.”

It reminded me of a 2012 Toronto Film Festival screening of Joe Wright‘s Anna Karenina. I was sitting in the seventh or eighth row, and during the third act some uncouth animals began chuckling at an emotional scene that wasn’t in the least bit funny. I distinctly recall whipping around and glaring.

I generally hate groups of people who laugh loudly in any context outside of watching comedies. I can tolerate laughter but only in short bursts, and that means no shrieking. I can be walking down a Manhattan street and if a group of younger people start to shriek-laugh at something, I’ll immediately flinch and snarl to myself “those fucking assholes,” etc.

The second-to-last paragraph in Crispin’s piece mentions that during a presumably recent screening of Blow-Up, people in the audience were cackling “at the mimed game of tennis, a group of people playing with an imaginary ball. It doesn’t get past me that [this is a] representation of atomization and isolation, the absolute inability to connect. The whoop of laughter is a signal to say ‘not me.’ And it’s pathetic because it suggests exactly the opposite.”

If I’d been at that Blow-Up screening I would’ve…okay, I wouldn’t have gotten up and thrown the remainder of my soft drink into the laps or faces of the chucklers — way too aggressive — but I definitely would’ve followed the chucklers into the lobby after it ended and politely asked, “Sorry to bother but if you don’t mind answering, what did you guys find funny about the silent tennis ball scene? I’m just curious because I’ve never heard a group of people laughing at it and I’ve seen Blow-Up several times. I mean, are you guys a new breed of some kind?”

I pretty much worshipped Louis Gossett, Jr. all my life, and I really wish I could have somehow seen him play “George Murchison” in the 1959 Broadway production of “A Raisin in the Sun,” when he was 23.

Gossett was arguably one of the handsomest actors to ever punch through to the big time, and definitely the best-looking and glowing-est actor of color within the frame of the 20th Century. And man, I sat up and took notice when I saw him in The Landlord, Skin Game (costarring with James Garner), The Laughing Policeman, The White Dawn and Sadat, the 1983 four-hour miniseries. Not to mention “Fiddler”in Roots.

And I really felt badly for the poor guy when he put on that lizard-skin makeup and costarred with Dennis Quaid in Wolfgang Petersen‘s Enemy Mine. which many were making jokes about as they left the Los Angeles all-media screening in late ’85. I remember exiting through the crowded middle aisle and doing my imitation of Gossett’s reptilian, gurgly-ass speaking voice.

But let’s cut to the chase. Gossett’s career-defining role was Marine Gunnery Sergeant Emil Foley in Taylor Hackford‘s An Officer and a Gentleman (’82), which landed him a well-deserved Best Supporting Actor Oscar. Peter Fonda‘s most famous line was “we blew it.” Clark Gable‘s was “frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.” Gossett’s was “I want your D.O.R….D.O.R.!” Foley is, was and always will be the greatest-of-all-time movie drill sergeant, and yes, that means he was better than Lee Ermey. Gossett was 45 or thereabouts when he gave that performance.

Gossett passed earlier today in Santa Monica at age 87.

All hail Simon West, Scott Rosenberg and Jerry Bruckheimer‘s Con Air, which is over a quarter-century old now. (Damn near 27 years.) I re-watched it last night with Jett, and it’s still one of the greatest sociopathic action comedies ever made. There’s a perverse satiric thrust built into almost every damn scene, which is one reason why I feel it’s among the best Jerry Bruckheimer flicks ever made.

I’ve been saying this from the get-go but it can’t hurt to repeat: Con Air is a blend of ultra-slick action-movie chops along with an attitude of subversive genre parody. It’s primarily a wickedly funny and (at times) almost surreal conceptual comedy, and secondarily an action thriller. It’s a very handsomely shot and well-edited thing but there’s barely a single sincere line in Rosenberg’s entire script.

And let’s remember that it wasn’t all Rosenberg — Con Air was punched up by a crew of pinch-hitting screenwriters, which was also how The Rock, Gone in Sixty Seconds and Crimson Tide came together.

Con Air plays the big-budgeted action thriller game while mocking and toying with big-budget machismo at every turn. Not in a silly spoof way but using a kind of flip, inside-baseball attitude. As if the people who were paid to put it together — gifted, too-hip-for-the-room writers with jaded nihilist attitudes — felt vaguely befouled for working on a project so caked with cynicism and Hollywood corruption, and decided to inject snide, subversive humor as a form of therapy.

The marvel of Con Air is that the mixture of this attitude with cold action-movie efficiency (this being one of those happy-accident movies that occur every so often) also worked as entertainment because the movie included you in — it made you feel as if you were laughing with it, not at it.

Comment from “jimjonesiii” (posted on 10.2.08): “I`m a fat redneck ape and I approve this movie.”

I love John Malkovich‘s performance as Cyrus the Virus — every line and body gesture says “this time out I’m a total paycheck whore, but you’ll also notice I’m very good at this sort of dry attitude comedy.”

I’ll always chuckle at the buffed-up Nic Cage at his most comically stalwart and sincere. And at John Cusack‘s smarty-pants dialogue and his dopey sandal shoes. And that scene of Dave Chappelle‘s frozen body dropping from 10,000 feet and landing on an old couple’s car hood. (Chappelle was 25 or 30 pounds lighter in ’97, and he had hair!) Cage’s “Don’t mess with the bunny” line. Steve Buscemi defining the word irony. Colm Meaney‘s muscle car (a Sting Ray) getting dropped from 2000 feet up. That idiotic Las Vegas plane-crash finale. Ridiculous but all fun, all the time.

Rosenberg once recalled that Bruckheimer wasn’t pleased with the climax Rosenberg had come up with. Rosenberg, being a typically egoistic writer, got defensive and snarky. Rosenberg: “Jesus…c’mon, Jerry, what more could you want from this thing? What do you want me to do…crash the fucking plane down the strip in Vegas?” Bruckheimer: “Yes! Perfect!”

Con Air is a remnant of an era in which Jerry Bruckheimer movies briefly flirted with with this special signature attitude — i.e., mocking the big-budget action genre and at the same time kicking ass with it.

Con Air was partly Rosenberg, of course, but also partly from Jerry’s own attitude at the time as he hadn’t yet come into his own and was still working to some extent with the legacy and attitude of late partner Don Simpson . And partly from the Clinton era zeitgeist, partly from the luck of the draw, partly good fortune.

The Jerry Bruckheimer who made this film in ’96-’97 would have howled at the absurdity of making a Lone Ranger movie starring Johnny Depp as Tonto.

I will defend Con Air until the cows come home. It’s expensive guy-movie junk in a sense — one that simultaneously chokes on its own cynicism and yet makes you laugh at the absurdity of making movies of this sort, and yet put together with great care and precision and polish.

Bruckheimer used to say “I make guy movies but I don’t serve hamburger — I serve first-rate steak.” Con Air is like a pricey, perfectly cooked marbled T-bone in a great restaurant in old town Buenos Aires or downtown Chicago or the east 50s in Manhattan.

I hold Con Air, Gone in Sixty Seconds, Crimson Tide and The Rock in roughly the same regard. All four are among my all-time favorite guilty pleasure movies. Those were the days. Jerry doesn’t make ’em like this any more.

“P. Vice“, posted on 10.2.08: “I love it. First we decry the unwashed apes and their pathetic taste in movies, then we praise shit like Con Air which is a movie about apes, made by apes for…you guessed it…apes. Hypocrites, one and all.

“And besides, Armageddon is clearly the real deal when it comes to slyly satirizing genre conventions while satisfying them with a straight face. Simon West doesn’t deserve scraps from Michael Bay‘s dinner table.”

LexG, posted on 10.2.08: “CON AIR = COMPLETE, TOTAL and WHOLESALE MEGAAAAAA-OWNAGE. I love that score. Especially the part that goes TSEW, TSEW, TSEW, TSEW over and over again. MASTERPIECE. And also the only time Scott Rosenburg’s weakness for wack-ass character names was amusing. DIAMOND DOG is somehow awesomely stupid, yet MR. SHHHHHHH and MAN WITH THE PLAN is just straight-up EMBARASSING.”

“Nick Rogers,” posted on same date: “Con Air contains some of the most subversive, and entertaining, ‘slumming’ performances I’ve ever seen. Wells, don’t feel guilty about liking this at all. Can’t say I agree with you about Gone in 60 Seconds (too much talking, not enough carjacking), but this is a brilliant post.”

[Originally posted on 9.6.20] I’ve been a sucker all my life for scenes of long-delayed revelation or confession that are nonetheless inaudible due to directorial strategy.

Two of my top three are YouTubed below. My third favorite is Leo G. Carroll‘s remarkably concise explanation to Cary Grant about the whole George Kaplan decoy scheme in North by Northwest. The all-but-deafening sound of nearby aircraft engines allows Carroll to explain all the whats, whys and wherefores in roughly ten or twelve seconds; otherwise a full-boat explanation would take at least…what, 45 or 50 seconds? A minute or two?

My favorite is the On The Waterfront moment in which Marlon Brando‘s Terry confesses to Eva Marie Saint‘s Edie that he was unwittingly complicit in her brother’s murder. Because it’s not just an admission but a plea for forgiveness with Terry insisting it wasn’t his idea to kill Joey or anyone else (“I swear to God, Edie!”), and that he thought “they was just gonna lean on him a little,” as he says to his brother Charlie (Rod Steiger) in the film’s second scene.

I’m mentioned the Mississippi Burning moment between Gene Hackman and Frances McDormand a couple of times before. It’s arguably the most powerful moment in this racially charged 1988 thriller, which is based on the infamous 1964 murder of three civil-rights workers. A third-act fantasy spin was the main criticism when it opened, but it emotionally satisfied and that’s what counts.

There’s also that Foreign Correspondent moment inside the Butch windmill when Joel McCrea can hear the murmur of bad-guy voices but not what’s being said. Others?

Cary Grant, Leo G. Carroll during the Chicago / Midway airport confession scene.