I couldn’t be more pumped to see Ang Lee‘s Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk (TriStar, 11.11) this evening at 6pm. Mine eyes will feast on the clearest, sharpest, most eye-poppy 3D film ever projected in the history of mainstream cinema — intense, extra-clear, super-real. And yet, it’s been said, very calming because this is how everything looks to anyone with half-decent eyesight. And it’s all at 120 frames per second, start to finish.

Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk director Ang Lee at Essex House — Friday, 10.14, 10:35 am.

Here‘s a brief chat I had with Lee and Platt after the press conference. Here‘s my recording of the whole event.

This isn’t The Hobbit, I was told. This is reality, immersive…no fantasy, no special lighting, no makeup on the actors. Your sense of being there will take over and either you’ll go with it or you won’t. But the ultimate state, Lee hopes, is that you’ll “make love to it and then again, over and over and over.” And that the film, in turn, will make love to you. And then, like with any good orgy, you’ll get lost in the back and forth.

All this was explained this morning by Ang Lee, producer Marc Platt and New York Film Festival director Kent Jones at a Billy Lynn press breakfast at the Essex House. The film will screen twice tonight in the highest, sharpest, most needle-precise format ever — 3D, 120 — at the AMC Lincoln Square at 6 and 9 pm.

I’m especially excited about Ang’s intention to project Billy Lynn tonight with light levels that will be way beyond the industry 3D norm — 30 foot lamberts, he says. Most 3D films are shown at 3 foot lamberts, he said. (What he actually meant, I suspect, is that the light levels are diminished to 3 as you’re watching the film through 3D glasses.)

Billy Lynn will also be shown Los Angeles later this month within the super-duper 120 fps/3D format, but most U.S. theatres — i.e., all but two — will show it at slightly lesser or lower levels — 60 fps, 48 fps or 24 fps, and some delivering just plain old 2D. Almost no theatres are equipped to deliver the ultimate experience that viewers will see tonight, but them’s the breaks.

Jones speculated after the press conference that within five years, what we’ll be seeing tonight will be mainstream.

It’s 12:30 pm now. I’ll about to leave for the Elle screening at the Walter Reade in a few minutes, and then the press conferences. And then a two and 1/2 hour break and then

Billy Lynn producer Marc Platt, director Ang Lee, NYFF director Kent Jones inside Essex House dining room at the start of this morning’s press event.

Again, the quiet chit-chat with Lee and Platt, and the whole discussion, gavel to gavel.

As previously noted, tonight I’m catching an 8:30 pm screening (which almost never happens — screenings are usually at 7 or 7:30 pm) of a major November release. And then an early wake-up tomorrow so I can attend a 9 am Ang Lee press breakfast for Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk. Then comes a 12:30 pm NYFF press screening of Paul Verhoeven‘s Elle, followed by a press conference with Verhoeven and star Isabelle Huppert. And then I’ll attend a 6 pm New York Film Festival screening of Billy Lynn at the AMC Lincoln Square. (Another follows at 9 pm.)

Two days ago a new Lionsgate Bluray of James Foley‘s Glengarry Glen Ross (’92) went on sale. As good as the performances are (particularly Al Pacino and Alec Baldwin‘s), I was never able to really sink into this thing because it wasn’t the play, and the play, I’m telling you, really was the thing. The play was way better. It got you high it was so good.

The Foley film? Not bad, decently rendered, respectable but too noirish and rainy — the glum mood is too on-the-nose. And for me it has no serious current except for Baldwin’s steak-knives speech, which wasn’t in the play.

Sometime around 3.25.84 I attended a Broadway pre-opening performance of the original Gregory Mosher-directed play with all the big-gun critics (Frank Rich, etc.) in the orchestra. Joe Mantegna‘s Tony Award-winning performance as Ricky Roma ruled — a performance as seminal and historic as Humphrey Bogart‘s Duke Mantee in the B’way stage version of The Petrified Forest. Not to mention Mike Nussbaum, Robert Prosky (a brilliant Shelley Levine), Lane Smith, James Tolkan, Jack Wallace and J.T. Walsh.

Today Michelle Obama very possibly delivered the strongest, most on-target speech ever given by a FLOTUS, about dignity and decency and human values: “I can’t believe that I’m saying that a candidate for President of the United States has bragged about assaulting women…it has shaken me to the core [and] this is not something we can ignore, not just another disturbing footnote…this was a powerful individual speaking openly about sexually predatory behavior…the shameful comments about bodies, the belief that you can do anything you want to a woman…it is cruel, it is frightening and it hurts…that feeling of terror and violation…something that happens every single day…none of us deserve this kind of abuse…not for another minute, and not for another four years. This has got to stop right now.”

I’m posting this clip to remind the readership of two things: (1) Leonardo DiCaprio‘s Wolf of Wall Street performance as Jordan Belfort was, is and probably always will be his all-time greatest — way above his remarkably immersive performance in The Revenant; and (2) this speech is both a brilliant lampoon of the drooling predatory aesthetic of your average Wall Street killer and an inspirational motivator for anyone stuck in failure and a loser attitude. It’s neither one nor the other, but both simultaneously. And now it’s a third thing — an echo of a certain imploding Presidential candidate and the Genghis Khan conquering rationale he almost certainly believes in.

This morning Joe Scarborough questioned the sudden torrent of news stories about Donald Trump‘s alleged sexual shenanigans. He tweeted later than he’s “disappointed but not surprised by those twisting my words…I have no reason to doubt any of these accusations whatsoever.” These stories broke because of (a) fear of reprisal and the old safety-in-numbers calculation — victims keeping silent until they realize they’re not alone (which is what happened with the sudden outpouring of testimony against Bill Cosby), (b) the Access Hollywood/Donald Trump/Billy Bush “pussy” tape, (c) Trump’s statement during last Sunday night’s debate that he’s never been an assaultive masher, and (d) numerous women Trump allegedly made moves on got angry when they heard him say that. Simple.

Credible-sounding, first-person, journalist-vetted stories about various instances of sexually aggressive moves by Donald Trump have been pouring out since yesterday, and I think we all understand that Trump’s “it’s all fabrication, all bullshit” defense is itself bullshit. Multiple torpedo gashes, water pouring in, the ship sinking, man the lifeboats, etc.

The Presidential campaign of the 70 year-old mogul was toast before; now it’s burnt toast. He’s not only finished, but will probably take the Republican Senatorial majority over the side with him. It’s not likely that the Congressional Republican majority will be overturned also, but I can dream, can’t I?

How could Trump have figured this stuff wouldn’t come out if he ran for President? One, he never figured he’d get this far when he first announced his candidacy. Two, he’s so encased in his hermetically-sealed reality that he figured he could just deny and bluster his way past any allegations that might surface.

Trump began his campaign by denigrating Mexicans, but in the end he was destroyed by his arrogant, Napoleon-the-conqueror attitude towards women. Eat shit, mogul. Enjoy the sensation as your lungs fill with sea water and screaming is worthless as you begin to black out from a lack of oxygen.

When I read this morning that Bob Dylan has been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, my first thought was “they waited until 2016 to do this?”

The man is alive and thriving and chugging like a train at 75, but he peaked 50, 51 years ago. Glorified in song, fable, movies, CDs and iTunes for decades. There isn’t a corner in the world where Dylan’s prose isn’t quoted, where his reach and eloquence as a poet-troubadour isn’t bowed down to, and Team Nobel waits a half-century to say “hmmm, yeah, okay…let’s honor the most influential and magnetic poet of the 20th Century”?

From today’s N.Y. Times story: “[Dylan] is the first American to win since the novelist Toni Morrison, in 1993. The announcement, in Stockholm, came as something of a surprise. Although Mr. Dylan, 75, has been mentioned often as having an outside shot at the prize, his work does not fit into the literary canons of novels, poetry and short stories that the prize has traditionally recognized.

“’Mr. Dylan’s work remains utterly lacking in conventionality, moral sleight of hand, pop pabulum or sops to his audience,’ critic Bill Wyman wrote in a 2013 Op-Ed essay in the N.Y. Times arguing for Mr. Dylan to get the award. ‘His lyricism is exquisite; his concerns and subjects are demonstrably timeless; and few poets of any era have seen their work bear more influence.’

HE riff #1: “A new manifestation of the ‘Surreal or Misheard Song Lyrics‘ riff I bring out from time to time. Last night I was listening to Bob Dylan‘s She Belongs To Me and decided that ‘the law can’t touch her at all’ isn’t as good and certainly not as primal as ‘Ma can’t touch her at all.’

“You can define ‘Ma’ as the proverbial family authority figure or some kind of tough, cigar-chomping butch boss in the tradition of Ma Barker or Maureen Dowd‘s “Ma Clinton.” I only know that ‘Ma’ rules while ‘the law’ litigates. If representatives of ‘the law’ can’t think of some way to mess with her mind and slow her down then so what? But if she stands up to Ma while wearing her sparkling Egyptian ring, that’s something else.”

Disney corporate wants that Star Wars cow milked to the max, and that’s what we intend to do…milk it! All hail the huge paychecks earned by director Gareth Edwards, co-director and screenwriter Tony Gilroy, screenwriter Chris Weitz and costars Felicity Jones, Diego Luna, Ben Mendelsohn (who is Mendelsohn without the glistening sweat and the cigarettes?), Donnie Yen (Chinese market!), Mads Mikkelsen, Alan Tudyk, Jiang Wen and Forest Whitaker (how slurry will his line readings be?). Rogue One: The Cousins pops on 12.16.

If I could ensure the financial failure of Doctor Strange by clapping three times, I would clap three times. How many ways do I hate thee, oh superhero fuckos? The suffocating of souls, the spreaders of poison, the corporate virus of 21st Century cinema.

A few weeks back I bought the Twilight Time Bluray of Elliot Silverstein‘s Cat Ballou (’65). Jack A. Marta‘s cinematography is crisp and colorful but lacking in character; the lighting is flat and too bright, only a step or two above the textures of a mid ’60s TV western. The stand-out element, of course, is Lee Marvin‘s dual performance as Kid Shaleen (good alcoholic gunslinger) and his twin brother, Tim Strawn (evil outlaw with a strap-on nose), which netted him a Best Actor Oscar. But Jane Fonda‘s titular performance is just as noteworthy. Cat Ballou is a mild western parody — light humor plus slapstick plus dabs of drama plus musical accompaniment by Stubby Kaye and Nat King Cole — but Fonda acts with all the passion and intensity she can muster. Yes, every so often she delivers some exaggerated expressions and gestures to convey that she’s in a comedy, but most of the time she could be playing the lead in Hedda Gabler or A Doll’s House. At no time does she adopt any kind of winky-wink, “just foolin’ around and collecting a paycheck” attitude. She’s serious about this dopey spoof and going for broke in every scene.

I just updated my Gold Derby predictions but nothing much has changed over the last couple of weeks. The Best Picture Oscar is La la Land‘s to lose, even though it can be argued that Manchester By The Sea makes for a far more penetrating experience. The two big stories of the week will be whether or not Ang Lee‘s Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk will punch through in some unexpected way and whether or not Warren Beatty‘s Rules Don’t Apply will deliver something extra. I’ve already decided in Billy Lynn‘s favor by virtue of the 120-frames-per-second cinematography, which I can’t wait to sink into.

“I don’t see how Michelle Williams doesn’t get nominated for Manchester By The Sea. She is magic throughout, but in one scene, you will not see better, this year or any. After that…who knows?” — from 10.11 handicap piece by MCN’s David Poland, titled “Settling Into The Starting Gates.”