New L.A. Times/Bloomberg poll numbers: Indiana — Obama 40, Clinton 35. Pennsylvania — Clinton 46, Obama 41. North Carolina — Obama 47, Clinton 34. (Dates conducted: April 10-14. (Obama’s “cling” story broke on 4.11). Error margin in each state: 4 points. (Sources: Mark Halperin’s The Page, Janet Hook reporting in the L.A. Times)
A friend called a while ago to report that he and a major newspaper critic were laughing out loud during a screening of Jon Avnet‘s 88 Minutes at Sony Studios earlier today. The film has played all over Europe (it opened in France on 5.30.07) and is in fact currently available on DVD is seven or eight countries as we speak. Why did Al Pacino make this thing? For the money, obviously, but are things going so badly in his career that he’s forced to do two movies with Avnet (i.e., this and Righteous Kill)?
“88 Minutes can’t even live up to its title. With 19 — count ’em, 19 — producers, including director Jon Avnet, ensuring that every aspect of the film, from the script to the star’s haircut, is ludicrous in the extreme, the picture easily snatches from Revolution the prize as Al Pacino’s career worst. Available on DVD in some territories as early as February 2007 and rolled out theatrically in France and elsewhere beginning in May of last year, this gape-inducing fiasco is getting a token domestic release that at least saves its star the indignity of a dump straight to homevid.” — from Todd McCarthy‘s nearly week-old Variety review.
Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) and Big (Chris Noth) get engaged, Samantha (Kim Cattrall) has moved to an LA beach house, Charlotte (Kristin Davis) and Harry (Evan Handler) get pregnant, and Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) and Steve (David Eigenberg) grapple with infidelity.” — from a solid, well-reported New York Post piece about New Line’s Sex and the City movie.
The article says that a good deal of emphasis will be given to glamour, clothes, bling, glitter — all the stuff that turns shallow women on. I hope it goes to Cannes so guys like myself can shred it with impugnity. Unless it’s good, of course.
Tracking says that Lionsgate’s The Forbidden Kingdom (an alleged ripoff due to the fact that Michael Angarano is the star, and that Jet Li and Jackie Chan are something like supporting players) will be the upcoming weekend’s #1 film with 74, 41 and 15. Look for a steep dive next weekend…over 50%.
Jon Avnet‘s 88 Minutes, believed to be the worst film of Al Pacino‘s long career, is tracking at 60, 37 and 12. How dumb do you have to be to not be aware what an absolute dog this thing is? And yet there are obviously tens of thousands who are preparing to go this weekend. Could they be the sons and daughters of those guys who made fun of Peter Falk in that Hollywood hardware store 24 or 25 years ago? I wonder how many of them plan to vote for John McCain or Hillary Clinton?
Expelled, the right-wing religious propaganda film, is tracking at 16, 24 and 4. Forget it. In and out.
Forgetting Sarah Marshall , also opening this weekend, is tracking at 62, 26 and 11. $10 to $12 million? Another Drillbit Taylor, or a comedy that may quietly catch on? The under-30 dipsticks I saw it with a few weeks ago were having a pretty good time.
Tina Fey‘s Baby Mama, opening on 4.25, is running at 56, 31 and 5. That’s a fair rating at this stage. Deception, apparently opening limited, is 45, 23 and 1 — phfft. Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo — 52, 34 and 4. Work to do, fellas!
Iron Man (Paramount, 5.2) is running at 75, 46 and 18. Really big. But it’s strictly a male thing so far. The first-choice rating for men alone is averaging around 28. Opening the same weekend is Made of Honor, the Patrick Dempsey romantic comedy. 58, 27 and 4, but among women alone it’s running 8 at first choice. Cal it an Iron Man counter-programmer.
“I have the luxury of having [been in] Scientology, and after having been in it, gotten out. And that’s a perspective [that] people who are in it, do not have. I think it’s destructive and a ripoff, and very, very dangerous for your health. I think it stunts your evolution. I think the farther you go up the bridge, the worse you get. That’s what I see.” — Jason Beghe, TV actor.
Defamer‘s Stu VanAirsdale has posted a video snippet of Robert De Niro‘s remarks at last night’s Meryl Streep tribute at Lincoln Center.
“If De Niro’s appearance is any indication, all those haters who ridiculed the actor’s agency switch last week might have another thing coming,” VanAirsdale notes. “De Niro killed. In a cruise-ship comic kind of way, perhaps, and filing through a fistful of index-carded one-liners, but still.”
HE comment #1: Yes, he did pretty well at the lecturn, but you can’t hear what he’s saying on Stu’s video — it’s too echo-y. HE comment #2: Despite his genius instincts as an actor, De Niro is not known for being the most intellectually gifted actor in the business, so it makes sense that he would bring along the index cards in case, you know, he “went up.” (Which happens to everyone.)
The best quote from that alleged written-within-CAA letter about De Niro’s departure: “Bobby blames everybody but himself for the way he’s squandered his career, and refused lots of quality pictures because they wouldn’t give him producer credit. [He] had a choice ten or so years ago. He could either go the Nicholson route — very selective, very particular, protect the brand — or go out sending himself up in tripe like Analyze This, which made money but turned him into that ‘old psycho guy.’ He could have concentrated on quality stuff, but instead wanted to keep funding his little empire in New York.”
Some of the finest title sequences of all time are viewable on Art of the Title. DVD-quality clips of the entire damn things and way better than YouTube except there are loading problems. The first two played for me — I watched the sequences for Bonnie and Clyde and Se7en — and then they stopped. You click on them and the wheels just whirl around and around and you’re just sitting there while life outside goes on all around you.
Some great opening title sequences that aren’t listed on the site: North by Northwest, Moby Dick, Raging Bull, Teh French Connection, The Hustler, Volver, the 1953 War of the Worlds, Zodiac, The Man With the Golden Arm, White Heat, L.A. Confidential, Dr. No, The Wizard of Oz…there are hundreds and hundreds that are very sharp and pizazzy and well presented. I could go on all day. They don’t have to be stylistically avant garde to be “good.” They have to arrest your attention, get you into the right mood, jack up the energy, etc.
The memory plays tricks but I’m pretty sure that the worst title sequence of all time was used for Neil Simon‘s The Cheap Detective (’78), a ’40s detective genre spoof directed by Robert Moore and starring Peter Falk. There are no opening visual titles whatsoever, as I recall. Falk says them to the camera. He literally says his own name and that of his costars, the screenwriter, the production designer, the editor, the composer, the director and so on. Am I mis-remembering? Am I describing some other film? I’m pretty sure it was this one. I remember sitting there and saying to myself, “My God, this is awful.”
Why are both Ed Norton and his Hulk incarnation looking down? They’re obviously troubled, forlorn, dealing with the weight of the world…but I don’t find this alluring. I’ve got troubles of my own, and I don’t go to movies to add to them. Of all the elements, themes and emotions contained in The Incredible Hulk (Universal/Marvel, 6.13), they chose to sell moroseness. Brilliant.
“Senator Clinton and Senator McCain question my respect for the workers of Pennsylvania,” Barack Obama said yesterday to members of the Alliance for American Manufacturing in Pittsburgh. “Well, let me tell you how I believe you demonstrate your respect. You do it by telling the truth and keeping your word, so folks can know that where you stand today is where you’ll stand tomorrow.
“The truth is, trade is here to stay. We live in a global economy. For America’s future to be as bright as our past, we have to compete. We have to win.”
Then, reports The Nation‘s John Nichols, “Obama did something that rarely happens in the trade debate. He spoke to worried American employers and workers as adults. He treated their concerns seriously.”
Read it or not, but the guy seems so much straighter and wiser and less consumed and in the grip of the usual shit than Hillary Clinton or John McCain, that it seems amazing to me that people are actually still dithering about whether he’s right for the job or whether or not he’s going to make it, etc. None so blind as those who will not see.
Patrick Goldstein‘s 4.15 “Big Picture” column is about The Soloist, a kind of uplift drama about the relationship between real-life L.A. Times journalist Steve Lopez (Robert Downey, Jr.) and a schizophrenic musician named Nathaniel Ayers (Jamie Foxx). I don’t know what it is, but it sounds like a blend of Awakenings, The Fisher King and The Killing Fields with mental illness taking the place of the Khmer Rouge.
One noteworthy thing about Goldstein’s piece is that the release date is revealed to be 11.21.08. This means, obviously, that DreamWorks, the distributor, believes it may turn out well enough to at least compete as an Oscar hopeful.
Based on a series of columns that ran in the L.A. Times in 2005, The Soloist has been written by Susannah Grant (Erin Brockovich) and is being directed by Joe Wright (Atonement). It’s about friendship and healing, but I’m worried by any drama about a colorfully crazy guy whose life is gradually saved by a guy who is healthier and more grounded but (I’m guessing but I’ll bet $100 that I’m right) is a bit eccentric himself and who is sorta kinda restored also by the act of helping the homeless guy.
I’m sorry, but on a certain level movies like this scare the living shit out of me. Guys who push their crap around in a shopping cart get on my nerves almost instantly. I don’t like movies about healing unless they’re absolutely genuine. If there’s even the slightest hint of Hollywood confection….brrnnnggg!
Quick — name another film that’s (a) partly set in downtown L.A., (b) costars Foxx as a delusional guy whose life is not working out but (c) is saved at the end by an eccentric benefactor.
Pay any kind of attention to HBO and you’ll see that Recount teaser over and over. You know…the docudrama about the Florida vote count muddle that followed the November 2000 election, directed by Jay Roach. I don’t care if Politico‘s Jeff Ressner warned last December that it might be too cautious a dramatization. It feels enticing and is the only thing I really want to see now, but HBO won’t be showing it to reviewers and entertainment writers until the tail end of this month.
Recount will debut for HBO viewers on May 25th. I should grow up and be patient, but I know it reads pretty well and my blood is up. I ran an enthusiastic a piece about the script a year ago this month (and got ridiculed by HE readers for being overly impressionable). I can just sense a certain juiciness, is all. Kevin Spacey, Dennis Leary, Tom Wilkinson as James Baker, John Hurt as Warren Christopher, Bob Balaban, Laura Dern as Katherine Harris, Bob Balaban and Al Gore and George Bush as themselves.
<div style="background:#fff;padding:7px;"><a href="https://hollywood-elsewhere.com/category/reviews/"><img src=
"https://hollywood-elsewhere.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/reviews.jpg"></a></div>
- Really Nice Ride
To my great surprise and delight, Christy Hall‘s Daddio, which I was remiss in not seeing during last year’s Telluride...
More » - Live-Blogging “Bad Boys: Ride or Die”
7:45 pm: Okay, the initial light-hearted section (repartee, wedding, hospital, afterlife Joey Pants, healthy diet) was enjoyable, but Jesus, when...
More » - One of the Better Apes Franchise Flicks
It took me a full month to see Wes Ball and Josh Friedman‘s Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes...
More »
<div style="background:#fff;padding:7px;"><a href="https://hollywood-elsewhere.com/category/classic/"><img src="https://hollywood-elsewhere.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/heclassic-1-e1492633312403.jpg"></div>
- The Pull of Exceptional History
The Kamala surge is, I believe, mainly about two things — (a) people feeling lit up or joyful about being...
More » - If I Was Costner, I’d Probably Throw In The Towel
Unless Part Two of Kevin Costner‘s Horizon (Warner Bros., 8.16) somehow improves upon the sluggish initial installment and delivers something...
More » - Delicious, Demonic Otto Gross
For me, A Dangerous Method (2011) is David Cronenberg‘s tastiest and wickedest film — intense, sexually upfront and occasionally arousing...
More »