Friend: “Going to 10 am press screening of The Lobster (A24, 5.13) — is it any good?” Me: “The Lobster is a dry, darkish, art-fart conceptual comedy with a touch of levitation by way of Rachel Weisz. It’s diverting for the first 45 minutes or so, then it runs out of gas. If you’re Guy Lodge, you’ll love it start to finish.” Here’s a version of my original Cannes review.

Last night Jett took me to Biang! (157 Second Ave.), an affiliate of the Xian Famous Foods chainlet. Subtly lighted and reasonably priced, this is easily the most exciting Chinese place I’ve visited in years. The Spicy Cumin Lamb Biang-Biang Noodles was the most startling, alive-tasting entree I’ve had since visiting Hanoi’s Pho-Thin and Bum Cha Dak Kim in a single day. (Here’s the HE summary.)

Read more

HE review, posted on 4.11.16: “Luca Guadagnino‘s A Bigger Splash (Fox Searchlight, 5.6) is a noirish Mediterranean hothouse thing — a not-especially-sordid sex and betrayal story that builds so slowly and languidly it feels like there’s nothing going on except for the vibe, and honestly? It’s so lulling and flavorful and swoony and sun-baked that you just give in to it.”

N.Y. Times review by Manohla Dargis, posted on 5.3: “The cinema of seduction doesn’t get much more overheated than A Bigger Splash, an Italian come-on that doesn’t just want to amuse you, but also to pour you a Negroni before taking you for a midnight spin with the top down.”

HE: “The undercurrent is gently mesmerizing, and that was enough for me. I can’t wait to see it again, or more precisely go there again. I felt like I was savoring a brief vacation. I’m not saying the dramatic ingredients are secondary, but they almost are.”

N.Y. Times: “Set on an Italian island slithering with snakes and beautiful people, the movie is something of a reluctant thriller about a rock star, her current lover, her former lover and a pretty young thing. Bad things happen, because, you know, life is pain — in the meantime, though, do enjoy the magnificent digs, the designer threads and the frolicking nude stars.

Read more

Friend who’s caught the current Roundabout theatre production of Long Day’s Journey Into Night: “You’ll want a drink or some morphine after that show. And I say that as a fan.”

Look at those Trump supporters with their shades and belligerence. Where in this video is the civility — the hope for humanity — apart from the witnesses? I felt for Ted Cruz in this instance. I did.

On 4.21 an IMAX quarterly earnings press release divulged that Terrence Malick‘s Voyage of Time, perhaps the most comically over-delayed film in the history of motion pictures, will pop in IMAX on 10.7.16. (Exact IMAX wording: “In addition, the Company will be releasing…a documentary film, Voyage of Time, on October 7, 2016.”) I might get around to seeing it…maybe. Okay, I probably will. But only out of habit because Malick was such a big deal between the early to late ’70s, and then a big deal again between The Thin Red Line and Tree of Life. But he’s more or less over now — To The Wonder and Knight of Cups have all but seen to that. Weightless, which I’m very reluctant to see, is probably superfluous at this stage. Nobody much cares. I certainly don’t. His brand has certainly waned across the board.

Obviously a wallow of some kind, but I have to admit that the dialogue doesn’t sound half-bad here — it has a sharp, well-sculpted rimshot quality. And you can sense a certain confidence from costars Mila Kunis, Kristen Bell and Kathryn Hahn. But none of this matters because you can’t trust a trailer. Directed and written by Hangover screenwriters Jon Lucas and Scott Moore, who co-directed 21 and Over.

Noteworthy: Bad Moms only began shooting on January 11th, or a little less than four months ago. The STX release opens on 7.29. Six months between the start of production and opening day is definitely unusual. What other super-quickies have happened this century? As far as I know no mainstream film was ever slapped together faster than Otto Preminger‘s Anatomy of a Murder — began shooting on 3.23.59, wrapped on 5.15.59 and opened on 7.2.59.

The spirit of submission and acquiesence lives in a Home Theatre Forum thread about the restored One-Eyed Jacks. Some of the commenters seem to recognize that the decision by Universal and the Film Foundation to slice off the tops and bottoms of Marlon Brando and Charles Lang‘s 1961 classic in order to render a 1.85 aspect ratio wasn’t necessary, and yet their attitude is more or less “whatever…we don’t mind!” A couple of commenters seem to believe that my opposition to this decision is based upon delusion or ignorance. In fact they’re the ones wearing blinders.

Let’s try again. One-Eyed Jacks was shot in the “flexible and compatible” VistaVision process and therefore could have easily been cropped at 1.66, 1.75 or 1.78. But no. In order to conform to a currently meaningless and completely political, consensus-driven suggestion contained in a Paramount memo back in the late ’50s (or whenever) that Jacks should be projected at 1.85, Uni/FF decided to follow suit.

This is not a tragedy — Jacks will look beautiful at almost any a.r. — but it’s certainly cause for lamenting. As I noted on 4.26, archivist Bob Furmanek is probably a chief culprit in this affair. By submitting and endorsing the Paramount suggestion, he relieved Uni/FF of any creative responsibility in determining the aspect ratio of the One-Eyed Jacks Bluray.

Read more

I cheered along with everyone else when Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger landed that US Airways jet on the Hudson on the opening day of the 2009 Sundance Film Festival and saved all those passengers from horrible death. I’ll therefore be cranked when I catch Clint Eastwood‘s Sully (Warner Bros., 9.9.16) four months hence. But are you gonna tell me Sully’s feat was even close to what Denzel Washington‘s William “Whip” Whitaker managed to do when things went wrong in Flight? Okay, so he’d had a few that day but he saved 96 out of 102 passengers. What a scene! And that co-pilot (Brian Geraghty)? A pathetic candy-ass.

Jonathan Jakubowicz‘s Hands of Stone (Weinstein Co., 8.26), a boxing + relationship period drama about the legendary Roberto Duran (Edgar Ramirez) and manager-coach Ray Arcel (Robert De Niro), will have a special non-competitive Cannes screening on Monday, 5.16. Pic costars Ellen Barkin, Rubén Blades, Ana de Armas and John Turturro. In prepared statements DeNiro and producer Harvey Weinstein indicated that the film, which completed shooting in March 2014, is more in the realm of Rocky than Raging Bull. Weinstein described it as “fun”; De Niro as a “good time.” Boilerplate: “The film is about the common history of Duran and Arcel, and about Duran’s successes of the ring in the ’70s and ’80s, including legendary fights against Sugar Ray Leonard.” Jakubowicz (Secuesto Express) directed and wrote.

(l. to r.) Ramirez, De Niro, Blades.

If I’m fully absorbing Larry Gross‘s riff, the best thing a director can be is (a) very bright, (b) profoundly talented and (c) possessed of a devotional attitude in terms of learning from the work of great directors. Some directors are instinctually gifted without being all that brainy or well-read but who’ve studied the greats (i.e., Steven Spielberg). Others are quite smart but with only modest talent (Woody Allen in Gross’s view). Or are modestly gifted but have learned everything they could from the best (Clint Eastwood in Gross’s view). And some are so in the grip of crackling intelligence that they seem to create more by design or scheme or deliberation than instinct. Which reputable directors appear (or have appeared) to possess all three attributes? Stanley Kubrick, for one. I know there’s a framed quote on a wall in Guillermo del Toro‘s Bleak House that references Albert Einstein, to wit: “Imagination is more important than knowledge.”

This is what Mel Gibson, Jason Statham or Bruce Willis do — try to save their daughters from kidnapping bad guys. Only this time it’s Nickola Shreli, an Albanian actor under the guidance of director-actor Malik Bader (Street Thief). Plus it feels like Nicholas Winding Refn‘s Pusher. Probably not a grade-A thing to judge from the third-tier festivals it’s played at, but at least it’s not the same old shite. I’d much rather see this than, say, The Nice Guys. Costarring Stivi Paskoski, Danijela Stajnfeld, Herion Mustafaraj.