Like Al Capone, Vladimir Putin evidently feels it’s necessary to elminate those who would threaten his empire. Capone’s Wiki bio says his palm prints were on 33 gangland murders between 1923 and 1930; it is believed that the Putin gang is directly or indirectly responsible for six killings. There can’t be much difference between a leader who kills six vs. one who kills 33. Ruthless is as ruthless does, and there’s clearly something afoot in Russia that’s similar to 1920s Chicago. The political arena is ferocious — increasingly defined by bullying, blood and bullets. Andrey Zvyagintsev‘s Leviathan was more on target than most people realized, and 99.5% of the American public couldn’t have cared less. It’s made a grand total of $874,000 since opening on 12.25.14.

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In its daily revealings of the mental prowess of not-that-hip, slow-on-the-pickup types, Twitter is the gift that keeps on giving. Last night’s enraged reactions to SNL‘s brilliant “college girl going off to join ISIS” spot (which costarred Dakota Johnson and Taran Killam) are the latest example. I can only presume these tweets were tapped out by worldly sophisticates who haven’t read about the British and American youths who have have either joined ISIS or proclaimed themselves devotees. The satire is obviously aimed at anyone who would cast their lot with the most vile and subhuman militants to walk the earth this century. But you can’t explain satire to some folks, and public discourse really doesn’t get much lower than it does on Twitter. The bit is obviously one of SNL‘s best and boldest.

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In a David Cronenberg interview posted on 2.23, The Dissolve‘s Calum Marsh mentioned a quote from Mubi critic Miriam Bale: “Bruce Wagner wrote Maps to the Stars as a broad comedy, but it isn’t directed that way.”

Cronenberg’s response: “It’s almost true. There are elements that are broad comedy, but I can quote [Maps star] Julianne Moore, in fact, who said she thought Bruce’s extreme hyper-emotionality and humor and my cool, neutral observational direction made a really good combination. And I think that’s sort of a more detailed version of what this critic was saying.

“If you had a director who really went with that other stuff, you would get a very over-the-top, exaggerated, and, to me, maybe a false movie instead of what it is — which is still funny. But the humor comes from within the characters, from the observation of the absurdity of the human condition, rather than a sort of self-parodying thing, or something that you could’ve done with it. And I think that’s correct.

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Is there any semi-logical basis to not strongly suspect that murdered Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov was killed for his strong criticism of Russian president Vladimir Putin? At least six other Putin critics have paid the price over the last eight years. Russian journalist and human-rights activist Anna Politkovskaya, a critic of Putin’s war in Chechnya, was shot and killed in her apartment in October 2006. Russian intelligence operative Alexander Litvinenko died from radiation poisoning a month later after claiming that Putin ordered Politkovskaya’s death. Accountant and auditor Sergei Magnitsky was imprisoned in November 2008 after exposing massive corruption, and was found dead in his cell a year later. Russian human-rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov, who had represented Politkovskaya and other anti-Chechen-War dissidents, was shot to death outside the Kremlin on 1.19.09. Human-rights activist and documentary filmmaker Natalya Estemirova was abducted and shot to death in July 2009. After renouncing two awards he had “received from Putin’s hands” because he was “ashamed,” Russian actor Alexei Devotchenko was found dead in his apartment last November, apparently under suspicious circumstances. Who’s next on the hit list? Leviathan director Andrey Zvyagintsev?

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After seeing Focus I naturally wanted to flush it out of my head, and I figured the best way to do that would be to see a really good con-man movie. So I bought a DVD of David Mamet‘s The Spanish Prisoner (’97). I’m pleased to report that it arrived yesterday and I’ll be watching it sometime later today. But here’s the odd thing. I haven’t seen it in 18 years (i.e., the 1997 Sundance Film Festival) and I can’t remember a single damn thing about it. Okay, I can recall three things. One, it was enjoyed and well-reviewed by the Sundance crowd. Two, Campbell Scott, Rebecca Pidgeon, Steve Martin and Ben Gazarra were the main costars. And three, it had a sly, measured vibe that was definitely pitched to older, smarter adults, and which everyone felt flattered by. Is this a new HE topic? Movies that (a) have a sterling reputation and (b) that you’re dying to see again, but which (c) you have no specific memories of. I can’t remember anything about Mamet’s Heist either, but I know I was favorably disposed when I saw it 13-plus years ago.

The Avengers was an unwelcome education when it came to the instincts of Joss Whedon. I called it “funny at times but basically a bludgeoning…corporate CG piss in a gleaming silver bucket.” The destruction-of-midtown-Manhattan finale was almost as hellish as Zack Snyder‘s 50-minute-long Man of Steel finale. My instinct, of course, is to to avoid Avengers: Age of Ultron (Disney, 5.1). I know…okay, strongly suspect it won’t be anywhere near as good as Captain America: The Winter Soldier, but that damn FOMO voice won’t leave me alone. I’d like to duck it altogether but the job unfortunately requires confronting films like this on the slim chance they won’t be soul-deflating. And it will seem necessary to respond to the reviews that Drew McWeeny and Devin Faraci, who live for films like this, will probably write.

Yesterday I posted a riff about Andy Grieve‘s Can’t Stand Losing You, a Police doc shot seven or eight years ago and finally getting a commercial release next month. As it happens there’s another seven-year-old rock music doc, Denny Tedesco‘s The Wrecking Crew, that’s opening on 3.13 or a week before the Police doc. On 7.6.11 Bryan Wawzenek reported that the doc, which Tedesco began working on in the mid ’90s, had been held up over music rights. The Wrecking Crew tells the story of a group of highly respected Los Angeles-based session musicians who played on a lot of popular singles from the mid ’60s to early ’70s. The Wiki page says the original “crew” was composed of Earl Palmer, Mel Pollen, Bill Aken, Barney Kessel and Al Casey. It also lists roughly 65 musicians who earned their stripes as floating Wrecking Crew musicians. That’s not a crew — that’s a town.

Yesterday TheWrap‘s Jeff Sneider reported that the Weinstein Co. will distribute The Founder, a Social Network-like drama starring Michael Keaton as McDonald’s super-hustler Ray Kroc. Sneider doesn’t mention when the film might happen but I’m presuming sometime in ’16. John Lee Hancock, a guy who seemed to understand how to make square, conservative-minded characters look interesting and sympathetic until he made Saving Mr. Banks, will direct from Robert Siegel‘s script. And you know it’ll be in the 2016/17 Best Picture conversation if Harvey has anything to say about it.

Museum-like replica of first McDonald’s franchise restaurant under Ray Kroc, located in Des Plaines, Illinois. The original Des Plaines franchise, launched in the mid ’50s, was actually torn down in the mid ’80s.

Could someone please send me a PDF of Siegel’s script? Not to review, just to read.

The Founder will presumably focus on Kroc’s marginally unscrupulous dealings with original McDonald’s founders Mac and Dick McDonald, not so much when he persuaded them to franchise McDonald’s nationally in 1954 as when he bought them out in ’61 for a relatively modest sum of $2.7 million. But I guess you can’t blame Kroc if the McDonald brothers weren’t smart enough to demand a better deal.

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I’ve added four titles to my 2015 Oscar Balloon list of Ambitious X-Factor films — Tom Hooper‘s The Danish Girl, John Crowley‘s Brooklyn, Bill Pohlad‘s Love and Mercy and Stephen Frears‘ Icon — for a total of 28. Add these to HE’s list of quality-calibre commercial films, which number 10, and you’re obviously looking at 38. And that’s not even counting my list of 13 hopefully or presumably high-grade popcorn flicks, which of course takes it to 51. 2015 is going to be a great year, and yet I wonder which of the 38 will be ready to screen in Cannes, or whether their reps or distributors will be interested in screening them there?

(l. to r.) director Alejandro G, Inaritu, Leonardo DiCaprio, dp Emmanuel Lubezki on the set of The Revenant.

The bottom line, as per custom each and every year, is that the majority of these presumed heavy-hitters won’t begin to peek out until the late August to mid September festivals in Venice, Telluride and Toronto. Probably a good 30 or so will be crammed into a twelve-to-fourteen-week release period. With the usual lean pickings between now and then. I don’t mean it’ll be awful but you know what I mean. The usual March and April-level releases over the next two months, and then the summer crap begins in early May and continues until late August. The Cannes interlude is always a blessing but we’re mainly looking at six months of theatrical deprivation between March 1st and fall festival time.

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Andy Grieve‘s Can’t Stand Losing You (3.20 NY, 4.3 LA), a doc about the nine-year ride of The Police from the perspective of guitarist Andy Summers (and based on Summers’ “One Train Later: A Memoir“), has been a long time coming. The film’s website says it “brings together past and present as the Police members reunite, two decades [after breaking up], for a global reunion tour in 2007-’08.” (Sting formally quit The Police in 1986 but the group had been on hiatus starting sometime in ’84.) So the bulk of it was apparently shot seven or eight years ago. Plus it was first screened at DOC NYC in November 2012. Why did it take almost two and half years to open this film commercially? There’s a hint why in John DeFore‘s 11.12.12 Hollywood Reporter review: “Of interest to Police fans but hardly a rock-doc for the ages, it’s best suited to small screens.”

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“I’m not talking about ‘following your dream’ either. I never liked the inspirational value of that phrase. Dreaming is a way of trivializing the process, the obsession that carries you through the failure as well as the successes, which could be harder to get through. It’s important and imperative to always be awake to your feelings, your possibilities, your ambitions. Every day is a re-dedication. Every step is a first step. Every brushstroke is a test. Every scene is a lesson. Every shot is a school. So let the learning continue.” — Martin Scorsese

All 13 episodes of House of Cards‘ third season are up and rolling. The idea, of course, is to binge-watch between now and Sunday night. The plan, ideally, is to watch two today or tonight, and then six on Saturday and five on Sunday. It’s my earnest hope that Kevin Spacey‘s Frank Underwood will out-connive or out-bludgeon his enemies and slither away from all his troubles like the black snake he is and always will be. I know Frank deserves to go down and be eaten by predators, but there’s something perversely enjoyable in watching him turn the tables and eat them.

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