This kind of well-phrased, David Mamet-level eloquence rarely happens in real life, certainly not among business colleagues, but it sure is wonderful to listen to in a movie or a play. You’re bathing in the deep mellifluous voice of Liam Neeson, and nodding with quiet satisfaction as you telepathically congratulate the man for finally landing a good, top-tier role that doesn’t involve kicking the shit out of guys. The only problem in playing Mark Felt, as noted before, is that Neeson will be going up against Hal Holbrook. The other thing is that critics are a tiny bit scared of director-writer Peter Landesman, partly because his first stab at directing, Parkland (’13), was a bust. Landesman returned two years later with the reasonably decent Concussion (’15), again as director-writer, but it didn’t make enough against the budget and p & a. But hope springs eternal.

Like many others I was touched and impressed by Kim Masters’ farewell piece about Brad Grey, “30 Years of Humor, Ruthless Ambition and a ‘No B.S.’ Relationship.” Honest and smoothly written. The best parts are the beginning and the ending, both of which allude to the last few months and especially the looming banshee:

“Like many who knew him, I was too shocked to formulate thoughts [when he passed]. He died so suddenly, so young at 59, and had seemed in good shape just recently. My first impulse was to call him and demand, ‘What the hell, Brad?’

“[Grey] had known he was sick for a long time but told almost no one. It seems his higher-ups at Viacom didn’t know. I hear Brad may have confided only in Bob Daly, his friend and discreet adviser, and confidant Lorne Michaels.

“I told Brad once or twice recently that he sounded tired, but he deflected that. On a couple of occasions, I thought that he was slightly slurring his words, and I wondered whether he might have had a drink to cope with the stress of Paramount’s terrible box-office run and the growing threat of being fired. But he was still shrewd and funny, and I didn’t think much of it, which obviously was how he wanted it to be.

“With a change in regime at Viacom and losses mounting, Brad insisted for a time that he would be perfectly fine with being paid to go away. Certainly he wasn’t telling the truth. He waged a ferocious fight to keep his job. He was sick, but maybe he still hoped he could live a while longer. Or maybe he hoped to die as chairman of Paramount Pictures.

As potentially cloying and manipulative as Wonder (Lionsgate, 11.17) may turn out to be, I’m responding to this trailer with feeling, just like I did two months ago at Cinemacon when I saw some footage. You can sense that director Steven Chbosky (The Perks of Being A Wallflower) has handled things with restraint. Maybe.

I reported on 3.30 that a Lionsgate spokesperson told the Cinemacon crowd “that Wonder has gotten the highest test scores of any Lionsgate film ever. And so the original release date, 4.7.17, was changed last February to 11.17, which means that Lionsgate is confident that Wonder has the Oscar nuts.”

Wonder is a delicate family drama in the vein of Peter Bogdanovich‘s Mask. Based on three relatively recent novels by R.J. Palacio, it’s about the journey of a young kid with a facial deformity (Jacob Tremblay) as he acclimates to school, and how his parents (Julia Roberts, Owen Wilson) and extended family help him along.

Palacio’s books were adapted by Steven Conrad. Wonder‘s costars include Mandy Patinkin, Sonia Braga, Millie Davis, Izabela Vidovic, Danielle Rose Russell and Noah Jupe.

A few hours ago Greg Gianforte, a Republican candidate for a Montana congressional seat in an upcoming special election, was charged with assault after apparently slamming Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs, taking him to the floor and breaking his glasses and shouting, “Get the hell out of here!” Here’s a recording of the incident; another is below. Simmering hostility and suppressed rage are par for the course for a lot of rightwing guys. Obviously Gianforte has hurt himself more he hurt Jacobs.

The Guardian reporter sounds upset, naturally, just after the skuffle — “You just broke my glasses!…you just body-slammed me and broke my glasses!” But (and please don’t take this the wrong way) Jacobs also sounds, to me, just a tiny bit candy-assy. Not to the extent that it’s a problem, but his voice reminds me of a kid I knew in third grade who was always threatening to tell the teacher that I was throwing spitballs and making faces behind her back. But let’s not dwell upon that. Obviously the bad guy here is Gianforte.

I couldn’t get into tonight’s 10:30 pm screening of Sean Baker‘s The Florida Project. I approached Les Arcades (77 rue Felix Faure) about 45 minutes before showtime, but the line was way too long. Hollywood Elsewhere will wait in reasonable-size lines, but not the kind that are so long they sap your will to live. HE friendo Aaron Salazar, an aspiring director, was at the very front of the line, but he began his vigil at 8 pm. I admire Aaron’s gumption, but no movie is worth a two and a half hour wait. There’s another screening on Saturday but I’ll be gone early Saturday morning. I’ll just have to see Baker’s film sometime this summer or certainly at Telluride/Toronto.

Late this afternoon I attended an Alfonso Cuaron Masterclass in the Salle Bunuel, which was basically the renowned director of Y Tu Mama Tambien, Children of Men and Gravity sitting for an 85-minute interview with French film critic and author Michel Ciment. [A full recording is at the bottom of this page.] They discussed Cuaron’s career — chapter by chapter, film by film — and showed clips. Fine.

And yet Cuaron’s upcoming Spanish-language Roma, which he shot last fall and is basically about a year in the life of a middle-class, Mexico City family in the early ’70s, wasn’t even mentioned. Which disappointed me. I attended this interview not to hear Alfonso talk about Y Tu Mama Tambien or that fucking Harry Potter film or Sandra Bullock or the blood splatter on the lens in Children of Men for the 47th time, but to hear Cuaron speak about Roma at least a little bit…c’mon! Would it have killed him to discuss what it is and what he’s going for, to allude to the story a bit and maybe discuss the tone, themes and whatnot?

I asked Alfonso if there’s any chance of Roma coming out by the end of ’17, and he said “noahh…I didn’t make it.” Maybe it’ll show up at next year’s Cannes Film Festival (an especially good place to launch any quality-propelled, non-English-speaking film), he allowed. Or maybe a year from next fall….who knows? But what a drag that he didn’t even allude to it.

Yesterday N.Y. Times critic A.O. Scott posted a tribute piece about the recently departed Roger Moore, titled “Roger Moore Was the Best Bond Because He Was the Gen-X Bond.” The gist was that “the older 007 installments” — the Sean Connery films, he means — “could never match the sublime, ridiculous thrill of seeing The Spy Who Loved Me, Moonraker, For Your Eyes Only and Octopussy on the big screen.

“Those movies were heavenly trash, with plots you didn’t really need to follow and sexual innuendo that struck my young eyes and ears as deliciously risque.”

Moore “exerted himself heroically,” Scott recalls, “grappling with villains atop a moving train, chasing them down ski slopes or into outer space, his unflappable suavity accompanied by an occasional smirk or upward twitch of the eyebrow. He knew exactly how silly these endeavors were, but he was committed to them all the same. He was an ironist and a professional, and as such a pretty good role model for post-’60s preadolescents.”

A nostalgic Gen-X take on the 007 films is fine, but let’s rub the fog off our glasses for a second, okay? Man up and rub that shit off.

There are only two Bond films that ever mattered and ever will matter, and these would be Dr. No (’62) and From Russia With Love (’63). These were the only Bonds that played the game with at least a smidgen of conviction. Yes, they smirked and nudged but they also took the solitary macho-stud assassin thing half-seriously, and they explicitly didn’t embrace the exploitational jizz-whizz approach (i.e., Bond films are about fantasy and made for the Disneyland crowd…why pretend otherwise?”) and were made with relatively lean and mean budgets. These two are the holy grail of the Bond franchise, and still the source of its power and mystique.

The great Sean Connery starred in these two but also in four other Bonds of gradually declining quality — Goldfinger (’64), Thunderball (’65), You Only Live Twice (’67) and Diamonds are Forever (’71). Goldfinger was diverting at times but the other three have become borderline unwatchable. I tried to make it through Diamonds Are Forever a year ago, and I just couldn’t take it. They’re mostly full of shit, these three films. Yes, even Thunderball. They don’t care about anything except flash, self-regard, cheap tricks and wank-offs.

Friend: “What did you think of Sofia Coppola‘s The Beguiled? I thought it was a slow–burning hoot. Coppola completely vacuumed out any of the original’s over-the-top sequences for more arthouse vibes and painterly pastoral framings. Those last 30 minutes are terrifically entertaining.”

Me: “Whoa, calm down on the ‘terrifically entertaining’. It’s pretty good, but not all that different from Don Siegel‘s The Beguiled. Less heated with more emphasis on suggestive humor. And shorter than the Siegel version by 11 minutes, 94 minutes vs. Siegel’s 105. Which I rather liked. Yes, the apple pie scene is amusing if not quite ‘funny’. I think Nicole Kidman barking “get the saw!” was meant to challenge Faye Dunaway shouting “get the axe!” in Mommie Dearest.”

Friend: “How about ‘Edwina! Bring me the anatomy book!'”

In rapid succession, HE has (a) the 8:30 screening of Sofia Coppola‘s The Beguiled, (b) an 11 am screening of Sean Baker‘s The Florida Project (and a 10:30 pm backup screening if something goes wrong), (c) a 2:30 pm showing of 24 Frames, the final film by the late Abbas Kiarostami, and (d) a 4:30 pm Master Class with Alfonso Cuaron, during which time he’ll presumably discuss Roma, his Spanish language drama set in ’70s Mexico City.

Update:  The 11 am Florida Project screening is a no-go due to the venue, Theatre de la Licorne, being in Cannes La Bocca, which would require a bus ride.

It must be gently said that the graceful and elegant and always gentlemanly Roger Moore, who died earlier today at age 89, never acted in a single grade-A film of serious quality. Not once. His commitment was to deftness and smoothitude, probably because he sensed early on that he wasn’t (and never would be) a Richard Burton, Tom Courtenay or Laurence Oliver-level actor. He knew who he was and what he wasn’t. That was part of his charm.

Moore’s career peaked with The Spy Who Loved Me (’77), which was arguably the most likable of his seven half-comedic Bond films (the others being Live and Let Die, The Man with the Golden Gun, Moonraker, For Your Eyes Only, Octopussy and A View to a Kill). It could be further argued that the Egyptian pyramids scene was the most gripping sequence in that ’77 film, and that Moore’s best on-screen partnership wasn’t with Tony Curtis in The Persuaders but with Richard Kiel‘s Jaws….we all remember that attitude, that humor.

Moore was almost too pretty when he was starting out in the ’50s. Dandified, insubstantial. He grew into peak handsomeness in the ’70s, when he was in his ’40s and early ’50s.

Moore once said that he “only had three expressions as Bond: right eyebrow raised, left eyebrow raised and eyebrows crossed when grabbed by Jaws.”

During a December 1980 visit to London I interviewed Moore during the filming of For Your Eyes Only, out at Pinewood Studios. He was never less than polite, gracious and considerate with me. He knew I was small fry, of course, but he treated me as if I was Roger Ebert or Richard Schickel. He made time for me between takes, and never did the old “I’ll see you later, I need time to prepare in my dressing room” routine that so many actors pull during set visits. It was if I was Moore’s personal guest, and he felt obliged to give me whatever I might want in terms of quotes and at least try to make me feel comforted on some level.

Only two Cannes ’17 films have really stood and delivered in exceptional, world-class terms: Andrej Zvyagintsev‘s Loveless and Ruben Ostlund‘s The Square, and even the latter didn;t end as well as it could. Two others — Jonas Carpignano‘s A Ciamabra (Director’s Fortnight) and Kaouther Ben Hania‘s Beauty and the Dogs (Un Certain Regard) — merit honorable mention. But by the criteria of truly startling art cinema, delivered with commendable discipline and impressive follow-through, only Loveless has made the grade.

Robin Campillo‘s BPM (Beats Per Minute) was initially overpraised, and this didn’t help once calmer, less invested voices began to weigh in. Michael Haneke‘s Happy End has been dismissed as a Haneke rehash. Yorgos Lanthimos’ The Killing Of A Sacred Deer has its fans, but many (the majority?) found it cold and repellent. I didn’t see Hong Sangsoo‘s The Day After but no one has been doing cartwheels. Noah Baumbach‘s The Meyerowitz Stories is decent enough as far as it goes, but the general response has been on the muted side. Redoubtable fared well with some, but it’s just as didactic as Godard became when he threw caution to the wind and went off the cliff in ’68. Bong Joon Ho’s Okja is a well-directed megaplex movie for kids, and cliche-ridden like a sonuvabtich. For me, Todd Haynes‘ Wonderstruck was so staggeringly simple-minded and generally disappointing that I still haven’t recovered. I missed Kornél Mundruczo‘s Jupiter’s Moon but again, no one to my knowledge has been doing handstands.

Tony Zierra‘s Filmworker, an 89-minute doc about the legendary Stanley Kubrick assistant and confidante Leon Vitali, is the juiciest and dishiest capturing of Stanley Kubrick‘s backstage life and career ever assembled. It’s about Vitali’s life, but by way of Kubrick’s.  (Or is it the other way around?)  21 or 22 years of deep focus, late hours, nose to the grindstone, passion, obsession, total commitment and almost no days off, ever.

Vitali began working for The Great Stanley K. in various capacities a year before The Shining began shooting, and then stayed with him to the end (i.e., 3.7.99). Researcher, gopher, go-between, driver, casting assistant, print cataloguer and (after Kubrick’s death) restoration consultant. The film is a completely satisfying record and assessment of that servitude, that era, that history, that ongoing task.

Leon Vitali — star of Filmworker, Stanley Kubrick confidante and right-hand-man for 21 or 22 years, former actor and controversial aspect-ratio debater — and Vera Vitali, the Stockholm-residing actress, at Cannes Grand hotel last weekend.

The photos and behind-the-scenes film clips alone are worth the price, I can tell you. Great stuff. On top of which I was reminded that Vitali played not one but two roles in Kubrick films — Lord Bullington in Barry Lyndon (’75) and “Red Cloak” in Eyes Wide Shut (’99).

Vitali said to himself early on that he’d like to work for Kubrick. What he didn’t expect was that once that work began Kubrick would want Vitali at all hours, all the time…focus and submission without end. If the early sentiment was “I’d give my right arm to work for Stanley Kubrick.” Kubrick’s reply would be “why are you lowballing me? I want both arms, both legs, your trunk, your lungs, your spleen, your ass and of course your head, which includes your brain.”

Yes, Virginia — Stanley Kubrick was no day at the beach. Then again what highly driven, genius-level artist is?

But he was also a sweetheart at times, to hear it from Vitali. It was just that Kubrick believed in trust and had no time for flakes, fractions or half-measures of any kind. His motto was that if you’re “in”, you should be in all the way. And Vitali was, obviously, and yet during those 21 years he worked on only three Kubrick films — The Shining, Full Metal Jacket and Eyes Wide Shut. But that was Kubrick, a brilliant control freak who wound up eating himself in a certain sense.