For some reason I can’t seem to recall the name of David Michod and Brad Pitt‘s War…the second word won’t come. Not War Games, not War Dogs…what is it again? War Machine. For whatever reason it won’t settle in my head. Pitt’s white hair sticks. The Afghanistan part sticks. Looking forward to getting past this. The word on the street is that it’s “Strangelove-ian.” To me that means broadly funny but in a way that’s (a) dryly matter-of-fact and yet (b) perverse.

Brad Pitt as Gen. Glen McMahon, a character more or less based on General Stanley McChrystal.

Around this time last year I mentioned that I’d bought my usual Paris-to-Cannes train ticket, and that the cost was 185 euros. In the comment thread Bob Strauss said “that sounds like a lot for train fare.” I agreed that the cost was high, but little did I know that I was being charged that amount because I was a clueless American. This morning I discovered that French natives who order SNCF/TGV train tickets online pay a lot less — 67 euros for the exact same first-class ticket. Repeating: I just paid 67 euros for a ticket would have cost 185 euros for if I’d bought it at Gare de Lyon in Paris, as I did last year. This is repulsive. I was half-overjoyed that I’d just saved 118 euros, and half-furious that I’ve been ripped off like a schmuck the last couple of years.

I don’t see a beastly figure in the bathroom mirror. I see a healthy, relatively trim, moderately attractive hombre who bears…well, a certain resemblance to the guy I used to be. (Last night Glenn Kenny tweeted that I had marionette hair — a resentful observation if I ever heard one.) But whatever limited solace or comfort I get from my reflection, it all vanishes when someone snaps a photo. Once in a blue moon I’ll be okay with an iPhone image of myself, but the ratio of “oh my God, please delete that” to acceptable or semi-acceptable (from my perspective) is about 75 to 1.

Myself and the SRO, snapped sometime in March. Mask was bought in Venice, and in the same shop that supplied Stanley Kubrick with all his gargoyle masks for that orgy scene in Eyes Wide Shut.

New York weather was moist and cool when I arrived yesterday morning. Then it got a bit colder, and then a heavy rainstorm hit. It was suddenly early March. I was wearing two jackets and a scarf. My train arrived in Fairfield at 11:30 am, but I had to return to Manhattan on a 2:30 pm train to catch Alien: Covenant, and under near-typhoon conditions. Then the rain stopped and it was strangely warm again. Today it’s cool and sunny, but who knows what meteorological upheavals await? On top of which it’s cold and rainy in Paris (where both Jett and HE’s own Svetlana Cvetko and David Scott Smith are currently bunking).

I’m staying in Connecticut until early Monday morning, and then I’ll have three and three-quarter days in Manhattan and Brooklyn. Dropping my bags at a Murray Street pad and then catching a 10 am screening. Three more screenings follow plus a Tuesday interview with Long Strange Trip‘s Amir Bar Lev, along with some Jett and Cait hang time. It all concludes with a JFK-to-CDG flight late Thursday night (i.e., 11:30 pm).

One way or another, New York City’s subway system always manages to try my patience. I’m not even mentioning the aromas, and don’t get me started on the people. I thought hyena giggling was bad in Los Angeles cafes and bars — it’s worse on the A train.

I can’t post my reactions to Alien: Covenant (20th Century Fox, 5.19), which I saw last night at Leows’ Lincoln Square. But I’ve already passed along a view from a European movie-critic pal: “It’s a prequel to the first Alien, yes, but much more a sequel to Prometheus, delving very much into the same themes and also going into the creation of the alien, creation being very much on the movie’s mind.”

I can at least say that if you hated Prometheus, as I did, you’ll have an opportunity to savor the same stomach-acid sensations while watching Alien Covenant. So while waiting for the embargo to end…

Posted on 10.5.12: “Prometheus happened so long ago it doesn’t even feel like it came out this year. I saw it in Prague on a rainy afternoon. Mostly I remember the humidity and how warm it was in the lobby as all the journos and media people stood around and waited for the doors to open. And how I was sweating under my baseball cap and shades. And then wondering why the projectionist was showing it in 1.85 and not 2.35. And then trying to make sense of it…and failing.

Ridley Scott‘s Prometheus “is impressively composed and colder than a witch’s boob in Siberia,” I wrote on 6.1. “It’s visually striking, spiritually frigid, emotionally unengaging, at times intriguing but never fascinating. It’s technically impressive, of course — what else would you expect from an expensive Scott sci-fier? And the ‘scary’ stuff takes hold in the final third. But it delivers an unsatisfying story that leaves you…uhm, cold.

Dunkirk director Chris Nolan presented a longish highlight reel during last month’s Cinemacon. It was visually commanding and certainly gripping as far as it went, but this extended trailer, released today, has more sizzle, or should I say drizzle? I’m not detecting any implications of a story or thematic arc here. I’m sensing a carefully composed, super-costly IMAX variation on The Longest Day, or at least a similar espirit de corps feeling — a war movie that’s not so much about victory or defeat or a grotesque misjudgment (which is what A Bridge Too Far tried for) as much as brotherly love.

Here we are in the beginning of May, which is usually about blossoms and sunshine and light jackets or sweaters when you’re visiting Fairfield County, and yet the weather couldn’t be more miserable. Raw, rainy, chilly, blustery — it’s like early March. On top of which I have to train back to the city around 3 pm in order to catch a 5:30 screening of Ridley Scott‘s Alien: Covenant. Raincoats, umbrellas, scarves…thanks, Connecticut!

Vanessa Gould‘s Obit, a doc about the lives and aspirations of a team of N.Y. Times obituary writers (editor William McDonald + Bruce Weber, Margalit Fox, William Grimes, Douglas Martin, Paul Vitello), has been playing in New York and Los Angeles. It’s not about death but life, perception and celebration, but then you’ve probably read that. It’s also about humor, perspective, devotion and the art of clean, concise writing.

When Bert Stern died on 6.26.13 I was the one who informed the Times obit guys, and then supplied contact info for Shannah Laumeister, Stern’s wife and director of Bert Stern: Original Madman. It was a sad moment, of course, but I remember thinking “hmm, this is intriguing…I’m delivering historical news to the Times obit guys, contributing to an obit that everyone will read.”

Ten years ago Joel and Ethan Coen‘s No Country For Old Men premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, and mister, what a moment that was. A No Country press luncheon happened a day or two after that first screening, and at one point I had a brief chat with Ethan about…well, read it. The whiners tried to beat me up for having spoiled the “final fate” of Josh Brolin‘s character, but I didn’t spoil jack diddly squat.

HE to Ethan Coen: “The only speed bump for mainstream audiences in No Country for Old Men, as you know, is your decision to not allow audiences to share in Josh Brolin‘s final fate, as it were.”

Coen to HE: “And that’s a perverse decision, isn’t it?”

No Country for Old Men co-director and co-writer Ethan Coen at Miramax press luncheon — Sunday, 5.20.07, 1:55 pm.

HE: “That’s one of the things that give the film artistic authority and distinction, and it either makes people respect it or…”

Cohen: “Or dislike it.”

HE: “Well, we all know that there’s a certain expectation [out there], that when you’ve spent the entire movie with a guy, you wanna…but for me, this is what makes the film extra-special.”

Coen: “And for us too. I mean, it’s just from the novel and [garbled]. But when you get to this point you say, ‘Okay, the movie’s not ultimately about this guy…so what is it about?'”

Before debuting June 9th on Showtime, Mark Kidel‘s Becoming Cary Grant will screen at the Cannes Film Festival. The title suggests a look at how the legendary film star found his professional footing or, you know, how he developed his on-screen persona. But the trailer indicates it’ll largely be about how Grant grew past his personal demons, and particularly how his LSD trips of the late ’50s and early ’60s changed his life entirely. 

In short, it appears to be a documentary version of “Cary In The Sky With Diamonds“, the July 2010 Vanity Fair piece by Carl Beauchamp and Judy Balaban that covered the same turf.

I am definitely catching this in Cannes. Because I know all about those lysergic acid realms.

From “Nirvana Flow-Through“, posted a year ago: “I would always describe what LSD did to my brain as a kind of blissful washover that freed me from everything I’d learned in school and thereby delivered radiant truths. The usual mental associations and thought patterns were rescrambled by my senses turning all tingly and Technicolored — an elevator-in-the-brain-hotel sensation leading to heightened sensitivity. Which led to the opening of Dr. Huxley‘s doors of perception and the gates of prana.”