AMPAS president John Bailey and CEO Dawn Hudson have announced three big changes to the annual Oscar telecast. The biggest change is the addition of a second Best Picture Oscar, to be called Outstanding Achievement in Popular Film. This is basically an attempt to appeal to the short-attention-span dumb-asses who have long resented that the Best Picture Oscar is more often than not won by some highbrow film that Joe and Jane Popcorn are either reluctant to see or haven’t seen at all.

In short, Bailey and Hudson have decided to dilute the importance and prestige of the Best Picture Oscar by creating a Best Popcorn-Movie Oscar, which will turn the telecast at the end of the ceremony into the People’s Choice or MTV Movie Awards. This is another attempt to accommodate the Oscar show to the sensibilities of the ADD crowd (mostly Millennials and GenZ-ers) as well as the New Academy Kidz.

Then again there’s a possible upside to this. Last year we shifted into a new era, determined by the NAK taste buds, in which genre films were allowed into the Best Picture arena. Now, with the new Popular Film Oscar, the lead contenders will be genre exercises in the vein of The Shape of Water, Get Out or this year’s Black Panther. Whereas the contenders for the Best Picture Oscar will revert back to films that actually merit the honor.

Call the Popular Film Oscar what it really is — the Popcorn-With-Extra-Butter Oscar for the Film That Knuckle-Draggers Like The Most.

The upside is that Hollywood Elsewhere might get more Phase One advertising from distributors of Popcorn Oscar contenders.

The second change is a decision to hold the Oscar telecast in early February instead of late February or early March, which might mean a slight reduction in Phase Two ad revenue for HE. (But maybe not.) The 2020 Oscars (i.e., the 92nd) will move to Sunday, 2.9.20, from the previously announced February 23. The date change will not affect awards eligibility dates or the voting process. The 91st Oscars telecast will still happen Sunday, February 24, 2019.

The third change is a determination to keep the Oscar telecast to a firm three hours. This will mean shortchanging the below-the-line winners (editors, dps, makeup and costumes, short subjects) by handing out their Oscars during commercial breaks, and then airing these winning moments later in the broadcast.

What the Popcorn Oscar will essentially boil down to is box-office grosses.

Perhaps the Pulitzer Prize committee will add a new award for Most Popular Airport Novel? Maybe the Tony Awards can follow suit with a special award for Broadway Musical Revival Most Enjoyed by Rube Tourists?

Alex Ross Perry‘s Listen Up, Phillip was about an angry, insecure writer (Jason Schwartzman) lashing out at almost everyone in his life, his longtime girlfriend Ashley (Elizabeth Moss) in particular. I finally caught up with this bitter black comedy a year or so ago. My six-word review was “wickedly amusing but reeking of toxicity.” It seemed obvious that Perry knows this kind of character like the back of his own hand — an abrasive, obnoxious, self-obsessed dickhead.

Now comes another Perry creation, a self-destructive rocker named Becky Something (Moss again) who’s “struggling with sobriety while trying to recapture the creative inspiration that led her band to success,” etc.

If there’s something slightly interesting and vaguely alluring about a woman character and you, a director-writer, wanted to describe this quality in an olfactory sense, you could call it Her Scent or Her Vibe or Her Aroma-rama…something like that. But Her Smell obviously indicates she’s giving off some kind of stink. If someone or something “smells”, it’s time for a bath or at least a garden hose.

Costarring Cara Delevingne, Dan Stevens. Agyness Deyn, Ashley Benson, Amber Heard, Eric Stoltz, Virginia Madsen, Lindsay Burdge, et. al.

Elizabeth Moss as Beck Something in Alex Ross Perry’s Her Smell.

The Oscar-winning Son of Saul (’15) convinced me that Laszlo Nemes, 41, is a major-league, heavy-cat director. But I have to be honest and admit that the trailer for his new film, Sunset, has left me with an odd feeling.

Set in 1913, Sunset is about Irisz Leiter (Son of Saul costar Juli Jakab) attempting to work at a Budapest hat store that belonged to her late parents. When the new owner blows her off, Irisz resolves to uncover the buried truth, which apparently has something do with the fate of her missing brother. I’ve watched the trailer twice now, and I’m sorry but it’s just not putting the hook in. There’s something a wee bit “off” and oblique about it.

Indiewire‘s Zack Sharf has written that Sunset “looks like a thrilling historical drama about family identity.” Maybe he knows something I don’t.

“Who’s an animal, yuh muthah’s an animal, ya sonufabitch…”

Joel and Ethan Coen‘s The Ballad of Flat and Scruggs….sorry, The Ballad of Lester Scruggs…sorry, The Ballad of Buster Scruggs will play the 56th New York Film Festival (9.28 to 10.14). Which apparently means that after debuting at the Venice Film Festival it won’t play Telluride or Toronto.

The three headliners at this storied Manhattan festival are Yorgos Lanthimos‘ The Favourite (opening night), Alfonso Cuaron‘s Roma (centerpiece) and Julian Schnabel‘s At Eternity’s Gate (closing night).

Other New York Film Festival selections: Jafar Panahi‘s 3 Faces, Jia Zhangke‘s Ash Is Purest White, Lee Chang-dong‘s Burning, Pawel Pawlikowksi‘s Cold War, Louis Garrel‘s A Faithful Man, Alice Rohrwacher‘s Happy as Lazzaro, Alex Ross Perry‘s Her Smell, Claire Denis‘ High Life, Barry Jenkins‘ If Beale Street Could Talk, Jean-Luc Godard‘s The Image Book, Ulrich Köhler‘s In My Room, Olivier Assayas‘ Non-Fiction, Tamara Jenkins‘ Private Life, Richard Billingham‘s Ray & Liz, Hirokazu Kore-eda‘s Shoplifters, Dominga Sotomayor‘s Too Late To Die Young, Christian Petzold‘s Transit and Paul Dano‘s Wildlife.

Universal has been developing a movie based on Cowboy Ninja Viking, the Image Comics comic book, since 2012. The original idea was for Marc Forster to direct and Craig Mazin to write the script. Chris Pratt was cast as the lead in November 2014. In January 2015, or three and a half years ago, John Wick directors David Leitch and Chad Stahelski were in early talks to replace Forster. Three years later (i.e., January 2018) Michelle MacLaren replaced Leitch and Stahelski. In June Pratt confirmed that MacLaren and members of the production team were in Berlin testing actors, with filming to commence last month. The plan was to release Cowboy Ninja Viking on 6.28.19. Today it was announced that Universal has taken the project off its schedule and “undated” the movie. Sources have told Variety that the film is “still in active development”, and that “the studio delayed the film rather than rushing it out to make the June 28 deadline.”

Repeating: They don’t want to rush it out after six years of development.

I’m getting the worst kind of perverse Michel Gondry twee vibes from this thing. Gondry + Jim Carrey + Mr. Rogers + black holes of self-loathing = Kidding, a new Showtime comedy series with Carrey, Judy Greer, Frank Langella and Catherine Keener…good God. The life of kiddie-TV star Jeff Pickles (Carrey) “spirals out of control” after an incident of infidelity is discovered by his wife, Jill (Greer). Has Jeff cheated on Jill with a puppet or a live human? I’d much rather jump off the Brooklyn Bridge than watch Kidding. I would watch it in a heartbeat if it wasn’t so Gondry-ized…if Jeff was a cynical, cigar-smoking, poker-playing infidel whose “Mr. Pickles” identity was a total lie…THAT I would watch and cheer and have fun with. Kidding premieres on Sunday, 9.9 at 10 pm.

I was willing to ignore Travis Knight‘s Bumblebee and just, you know, let it make whatever money it’s going to be make. But this possible-Best-Picture, possible-live-action sequel to Iron Giant thing blows that attitude all to hell. Collider‘s Jeff Sneider is sending a coded message to the New Academy Kidz: “You guys decided last year that genre films (Get Out-meets-Stepford Wives, The Creature From The Love Lagoon) are acceptable candidates for the Best Picture Oscar. So feel free, guys…man up and do what you will when it comes to assessing Bumblebee. Perhaps a Best Picture candidate or perhaps not, but only you have the power to decide.

“All hail the New Hollywood Reality and the fact that the New Academy Kidz have reset and restarted the whole game. No more carte blanche approval of traditional, boomer-friendly, Oscar-tailored films in the realm of The Post, The Imitation Game, The King’s Speech and all the rest of that calculated baity crap…you guys are the new kings and the new kingmakers. If you decide to anoint Bumblebee, you’ll get no shit from me about it. I for one respect the New Academy Kidz…I’ve got your six!”

In a just-posted GQ interview written by Zack Baron, Ethan Hawke declares that “a middle-class lifestyle was always enough for me.” He means that he doesn’t need to swagger around like Johnny Depp or Robert De Niro or anyone in the superstar bucks-up realm. “Like, I needed to pay my doctors’ bills and I needed to get my kids to school, but I don’t need three pairs of shoes,” Hawke says. “One pair of shoes is fine. And I don’t need more bedrooms. I don’t need bedrooms for fantasy houseguests, you know, that don’t arrive.”

I relate to Hawke’s proclamation of modest living standards. I grew up comfortably in suburban New Jersey and exurban Connecticut, but I’ve lived on the lean and mean side for decades. I was a Venice home-owner for three years, but otherwise a renter. No muscle car, no lavish wardrobe, no electronic toys, no McMansion, no clubbing, hardly any eating out and zero pricey vacations. Travelling around to film festivals (Cannes, Telluride, Toronto, Sundance) and alighting every so often to Rome, Paris, Munich, Prague and Hanoi has been my biggest luxury.

Does anyone believe that Hawke only owns one pair of shoozie-woozies? I don’t. I think he’s speaking metaphorically. I’m betting he’s got at least eight or ten pairs if not more. Plus a cool metal shoe rack. I own about 15 pairs including workout and hiking shoes (plus one pair of canary yellow tennis shoes that I never wear), and I don’t think I’m even close to being a male Imelda Marcos.

Why is Hawke talking to GQ? Because Blaze, which he directed, pops in early September. And because Paul Schrader‘s First Reformed, which contains Hawke’s greatest acting triumph in years, is streeting and streaming, and he obviously wants to be in the forthcoming Best Actor conversation. Hawke deserves to be nominated. It’ll almost certainly happen. But you have to remind people, and you never know these days about the New Academy Kidz.

Robert Redford, who turns 82 on 8.18, first disclosed his intention to retire from acting on 11.10.16, in an interview with his grandson Dylan. Several publications reported this the next day, although Redford’s publicist, Cindy Berger of PMK*BNC, insisted otherwise, claiming that her client “is certainly not retiring because he has several projects coming down the pike.”

Well, Redford said a day or two ago that he’s really, really hanging up his spurs, and that David Lowery‘s The Old Man and the Gun (Fox Searchlight, 9.28) will be his gentleman swan song.

Redford’s greatest accomplishment, hands down, was launching the Sundance Film Festival. He really and truly changed…hell, revolutionized the landscape of American independent film. He upgraded, deepened, emboldened and monetized it beyond all measure.

The best film he ever directed was Ordinary People; Quiz Show and The Milagro Beanfield War were a distant second and third. The worst film he ever directed was The Legend of Bagger Vance, a.k.a. “bag of gas.” But acting is what he’s retiring from, and so an assessment of his best films and performances is in order.

Margot Robbie has her Sharon Tate down pretty well. Or Quentin Tarantino‘s costume or hair people do, I should say. I’m sure Robbie feels good about playing someone hot and sexy after looking like a pasty-faced, flame-haired horror in Mary, Queen of Scots. I’ve said this five or six times, but we don’t want to see the slaughter in Once Upon A Time in Hollywood. We want Leo and Brad to bust in and blow Tex Watson away, and maybe one of the Manson girls besides.

I posted the Maniac teaser seven days ago, but this is standard procedure, the old one-two penetration. For a collaboration between Cary Fukanaga, Emma Stone and Jonah Hill, HE’s full attention is required. That plus a general presumption-of-quality attitude. I have to put that out there.