Taika Watiti‘s Jojo Rabbit (Fox Searchlight/Disney, 10.18), an absurdist black comedy, is seemingly destined to rock the Oscar race if — I say “if” — the New Academy Kidz have anything to say about it. For this is definitely a New Academy Kidz type of film. It’s ballsy, cockeyed, nutso, out there…it is, after a fashion, sardonic hipness incarnate. In flagrant quotes. And it certainly resides in its own surrealistic realm, which I respected as far as it went. It doesn’t believe in anything other than its own determinations, and that’s fine.

It’s basically an Impressionable Hitler-Youth Perspective of Viennese Naziland, broadly played for satiric effect. Satire aimed at simpletons, I should say, but it’s all so saturated in winking irony so I actually meant that it’s aimed at, you know, “simpletons.” It’s a stylistic wank-off and about a quarter-inch deep, but there was a seasoned industry guy sitting behind me who couldn’t stop laughing, and heartily at that. At one point I half turned in my seat as if to say “what the fuck?”, but I didn’t turn all the way around.

I don’t know everything. I’m not God or the reincarnation of James Agee or some kind of Ultimate Arbiter. I’m just a bigmouth with a platform. If the guy sitting behind me found it hilarious, whom am I to say he’s wrong or short-sighted? Or that the New Academy Kidz who believe it’ll be nominated for Best Picture are living on Planet Uranus? They may be right.

Watiti’s basic message is that “ethnic hatred is not only evil but stupid and pathetic” and that “anyone with a heart and soul will understand the truth of this sooner or later.” I for one agree with this assessment. Anyone opposed?

Roman Griffin Davis plays the Hitler youthie, but he never seems radically committed to Aryan supremacy and/or notions of the thousand-year Reich. (He struck as a none-too-bright softie, a poseur.) Watiti plays an imaginary Adolf Hitler goofball by way of a lobotomized Soupy Sales figure. Plus the film has a progressive-minded mother (Scarlett Johansson) who was time-machined in from 2019. Plus Sam Rockwell — easily the best actor playing the funniest role — as Captain Klutzendorf, a Nazi captain who runs a Hitler Youth camp, and also propelled by 21st Century hipster attitudes. (I just lied about Rockwell’s character — his name is actually Captain Klenzendorf.) Thomasin McKenzie plays Elsa, a take-charge Jewish girl hiding out in JoJo’s attic.

My second favorite character and performance is Jojo’s fat Nazi pally, played in a likably laidback way by Archie Yates.

The strongest influences noted by Toronto critics were Mel Brooks’ “Springtime for Hitler” number in The Producers and a kind of highly poised, deliberately antiseptic Wes Anderson aesthetic — a certain toy-shop tweeness or ironic “lay on the fake icing” quality. I agree with these measurements. JoJo Rabbit is Wes Anderson meets “Springtime for Hitler.”

I honestly prefer the Max Fischer Players in terms of realism, production design, wit, visual panache. But I understand and “respect” what JoJo Rabbit is up to. The people who love it aren’t wrong — they’re just easy lays. There’s nothing wrong with being an easy lay. I’ve been one myself from time to time, and I’ll be one again when the right film comes along.

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Yesterday on Facebook agent Justin Ptak posted a list of the best movies about filmmaking, and then he asked me, among others, if he’d missed anything.

Yeah, I said. He missed two Vincent Minnelli whoppers — The Bad and the Beautiful (’52) and Two Weeks In Another Town (’62).

Among Ptak’s favorites: Barton Fink (1991), The Player (1992), In a Lonely Place (1950), Day for Night (1973), Adaptation (2002), Sullivan’s Travels (1941), 8 1/2 (1963), Bowfinger (1999), Saving Mr. Banks (2013), Singin’ in the Rain (1952), Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019), Sunset Blvd. (1950), The Artist (2011), Hail, Caesar! (2016), The Disaster Artist (2017), A Star is Born (1954), Tropic Thunder (2008), Postcards from the Edge (1990), Shadow of the Vampire (2000), Living in Oblivion (1995) and The Stunt Man (1980).

In the comment thread for yesterday’s “Hustlers and Fools” riff, which was mainly about Adam Sandler‘s performance in Uncut Gems, “pmn” mentioned that for all their hormonal or mannered sloppiness, directors Josh and Benny Safdie are at the very least “New York filmmakers” in the classic mode, and that this kind of attitudinal persuasion “seems like a dying breed as New York has morphed into a giant strip mall. The Safdies seem to be able to zero in on the last few pockets of character left in the city.”

To which I replied: That’s a significant thing. As the classically scrappy, Sidney Lumet-like depictions of 20th Century Manhattan (urgent, pugnacious, edgy, ethnic, pointed, blunt) are becoming more and more eroded and diluted and sanded down by corporatism and skyrocketing rents, the value of high-personality New York movies like Uncut Gems (which, don’t get me wrong, I found infuriating for its complete lack of interest in exploring anything but how it feels to ride on the back of a gambling edge-junkie tiger)…the ethnic, pushy atmosphere of such films is starting to seem more and more valuable as the social forces, aromas, attitudes and pulsebeats that fed into your classic 20th Century NYC culture are starting to lose more and more of their influence as the corporate, tourist-friendly strip-mall aesthetic creeps in and influences and even to some extent dictates the cultural tone of that town, certainly as far as Manhattan is concerned.

When was New York City really and truly a classic Lumet-like culture? The ‘80s were the last authentic gasp. The corporate clean-up began in the Mayor Giuliani era of the ‘90s. The peak era of feisty Manhattan movies ran from the late ‘40s to late ‘80s.

What are my all-time favorite New York flavor movies? The top two are Lumet’s Prince of the City (’81) and William Friedkin‘s The French Connection (’71). Followed by Sweet Smell of Success, Naked City, Midnight Cowboy, Do The Right Thing, Taxi Driver, Serpico, Manhattan, The Godfather, King of New York, Dog Day Afternoon, Bad Lieutenant, Detective Story, On The Waterfront, Across 110th Street, Shaft, Patterns, Metropolitan, Saturday Night Fever, 12 Angry Men, Marathon Man, After Hours. But NOT West Side Story — too antiseptic and Robert Wise-y. And NOT Fame. And NOT Breakfast at Tiffany’s or The Devil Wears Prada.

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…and concludes that there was no quid pro quo between Ukranian president Volodymyr Zelensky pledging an attempt to collect potential dirt on Joe Biden and President Trump offering to unlock $400 million in U.S. aid…anyone who reads the transcript and doesn’t recognize or acknowledge what was actually being said is either (a) a liar, (b) a stooge, (c) five years old or younger or (d) a complete idiot.

“From a quid pro quo aspect, there’s nothing there,” said South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham. Absolutely!

Any news reporter or analyst who says, “Well, gee…Trump didn’t precisely and explicitly link the release of the $400 million to Zelensky pledging to investigate Biden for all its worth…there’s no actual smoking gun here“…any reporter or analyst who asserts this is either rock stupid or deliberately attempting to obscure the obvious.

Remember that third-act diner scene in Goodfellas when Robert De Niro asks Ray Liotta if he could fly down to Florida on vacation “and take care of this thing”? Mobsters and crime bosses never say “I want you to murder this guy because he ratted us all out” or “I want you to stick an icepick in this guy’s neck in order to keep him from testifying against me.” They say “I know you’ll take care of the problem”…enough said!

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I was keen to see Mark Landsman‘s Scandalous (Magnolia, 11.15), a seemingly engrossing “deep dive” documentary about the National Enquirer, ten seconds into the trailer.

Favorite Landsman quote: “The real story behind the National Enquirer is like a classic monster movie from the 1950s where initially the creature doesn’t intend to harm anyone, but is soon wreaking havoc on the population. I was fascinated by the men and women who made that havoc happen, and thrilled to have the opportunity to tell the inside story.”

I’ve had the same basic attitude about the National Enquirer for a long time, which is that most of the stuff they publish is rancid upchuck but every now and then (i.e., rarely) they go above and beyond by reporting a credible story with hard facts, photos and other evidence. Like the John Edwards love child thing in 2008. And the Bristol Palin pregnancy story the same year. They’ve always seemed to excel at pants-down stories.

Otherwise I’m so disinterested that I don’t even flip through it during Pavilions checkout waits. The storied tab is primarily know these days for shilling (or “catching and killing”) on behalf of the Trump administration, etc. Believed by the stupidest people in the country, etc. The attempt to blackmail Amazon’s Jeff Bezos was a partisan attempt to serve Trump by undermining the owner of the Washington Post, etc.

The talking heads include Ken Auletta, Carl Bernstein, Iain Calder, Steve Coz, Jerry George, Gigi Goyette, Maggie Haberman and Barbara Sternig.

This Is Just A Test Media produced Scandalous with CNN Films and AGC Studios serving as executive producers. CNN Films will retain North American broadcast rights.

I’n leaving for my 2 pm screening of A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. I’ll have a little filing time at a Pico Blvd. Starbucks between 4 pm and 6 pm. Then comes a 7 pm encounter with Jojo Rabbit. And on that note…

Nancy Pelosi‘s longstanding reticence about launching impeachment proceedings against President Trump has always been (and remains) about the certain failure of this effort once it reaches the U.S. Senate, given the Republican majority.

The Ukraine whistleblower matter has changed that thinking. Pelosi is now concluding that House Democrats have no choice but to impeach even though Trump can’t be removed from office. Pelosi’s fear is that Trump will naturally claim total exoneration once the Senate votes against impeachment, and that he’ll use this to boost his standing among the under-educated, less intelligent [read: dumber] sector of the U.S. electorate. Which would improve his chances of re-election.

The key is for Democrats to proclaim over and over that they are compelled out of moral and ethical necessity to bring articles of impeachment against Trump, even though venal Senate Republicans will block Trump’s removal.

The default slogan has to be “we know this can’t succeed, but with an unregenerate immoral animal in the White House, we have no choice but to do this.”

Posted at 3:11 pm eastern in the N.Y. Times: “Speaker Nancy Pelosi plans to announce on Tuesday that the House will begin a formal impeachment inquiry of President Trump, Democrats close to her said, taking decisive action in response to startling allegations that the president sought to enlist a foreign power for his own political gain.

“After months of caution, Ms. Pelosi has become convinced that Mr. Trump’s reported actions, and his administration’s refusal to share details about the matter with Congress, left the House no alternative but to move forward with an inquiry that has the potential to reshape his presidency and cleave an already divided nation just a year before he plans to stand for re-election.”

No stones, no gambling, no nothing. I’ve never even flirted with the idea of betting on sports competitions as an ongoing diversion, and the only reason I shelled out for a nice wedding ring two and half years ago was because it was important to Tatyana. Otherwise forget it. Bling ain’t the thing. This aside, Adam Sandler is indisputably insane as a diamond-district broker with a ridiculous gambling addiction. More Gold Derby-ites besides myself and Yahoo’s Kevin Polowy should get behind him.

Several screenings over the next seven or eight days. A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood tomorrow (Tuesday, 9.24) at 2 pm, and then a JoJo Rabbit on the Fox lot at 7 pm. The brief commercial opening of Steven Soderbergh‘s The Laundromat happens at the Landmark on the evening of Thursday, 9.26, and without an ability to catch a previous private screening I’ll probably be attending. A 10 am showing of a certain Lawrence of Arabia-sized film happens the next day, followed by a 5 pm viewing of Ladj Ly‘s Les Miserables (the first showing was in Cannes last May) at the DGA COLCOA Festival. The big Joker premiere happens on Saturday evening, 9.28, at the Chinese. A Beyond Fest screening of The Vast of Night on Monday, 9.30, and then a follow-up screening of Luce (my last viewing was nine months ago at Sundance ’19) at Soho house on Tuesday, 10.1 at 7:30.

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