My respect and admiration for Amy Adams is considerable, but I can’t see her inhabiting the deep-down aspects of Janis Joplin in the forthcoming Jean-Marc Vallee-directed biopic. Adams has been excellent at conveying quiet fortitude, determination and resolve (Margaret Keane in Big Eyes, con artist in American Hustle, wife of Phillip Seymour Hoffman in The Master, concerned nun in Doubt). But Joplin was about a combination of delicate vulnerabilty and scrappy, blues-wailing, whisky-drinking sass, and I just can’t imagine Adams really diving into that. Her speaking voice lacks that raspy, cackly-laugh quality, and she has a generally demure Southern-belle vibe that argues with the way Joplin behaved on-stage — that spunky but hurting soul-woman thing. I only know that when I heard Adams had been firmly cast as Joplin, a voice inside me said “really?”

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I realize, of course, that right now the smart set is betting on The Theory of Everything‘s Eddie Redmayne to take the Best Actor Oscar on 2.22. That, of course, is due to Redmayne having won the SAG Award for Best Actor but don’t kid yourself — it’s currently a neck-and-neck thing between Redmayne and Birdman‘s Michael Keaton, and after last night’s emotional Keaton tribute at the Santa Barbara Film Festival, I’m thinking that…well, that Redmayne might win. Let’s be honest. I’m a committed Keaton guy, of course. He didn’t just give the performance of the year but one of the best of the 21st Century…ahh, what do I know?

Birdman‘s Michael Keaton being interviewed last night by Leonard Maltin at Santa Barbara’s Arlington theatre.

Keaton, I feel, is the guy to vote for because (a) he has the comeback narrative (playing a version of himself, re-igniting his career), (b) his Riggan Thomson performance is more of a soul-baring, pull-out-the-stops performance than Redmayne’s, which, due respect, is primarily about simulating isolation by way of physical affliction, necessitating a less-is-more acting style while sitting in a wheelchair, and (c) Keaton doesn’t have a Norbit movie opening on February 6th. (I’m sorry but the Wachowski film is exuding a definite stink and, unfair as it seems, I can’t imagine that on some level that Jupiter Ascending won’t rub off on Redmayne, at least in a pollen-sprinkling sense.)

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The 2015 Oscar telecast happens three weeks from today. If producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron are smart, they’ll try to make it play as well as last year’s show (which wasn’t too bad) and avoid the general awfulness of the 2013 Oscar telecast. That show was summed up by…well, you tell me. For some, I’m sure, it was Seth McFarlane‘s singing “We Saw Your Boobs.” Or the generally slick, shmaltzy, out-of-time Las Vegas vibe. For others it was the borderline absurd decision to hand Quentin Tarantino the Best Original Screenplay Oscar for Django Unchained (and in so doing ignore Mark Boal‘s infinitely superior Zero Dark Thirty screenplay). Or the show reminding everyone what a great film Chicago was. But for me it was the decision to have the hummingbird-sized Kristin Chenoweth (4’11”) do red-carpet interviews, and in so doing make 90% of the women she spoke to look like seven-foot-tall, 285-pound Amazons. How clueless did Zadan and Meron have to be to not realize this would happen?

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A little less than five months ago, or more precisely between 9.8 and 9.13, I was in a levitational state over Paul Dano‘s performance as the young Brian Wilson in Bill Pohlad‘s Love & Mercy. I was certain I’d seen one of the best lead-actor performances of 2014 — hands down, no question — and was savoring the rough and tumble of an award-season campaign. I knew Dano could never win, but he had to at least be nominated, I was telling myself. He was too good, too “miraculous” (in the view of BBC.com’s Owen Gleiberman) to be shunted aside. And then it all came crashing down when I learned that Roadside Attractions had decided to open Love & Mercy in 2015, and not even give it a one-week qualifying run to attract year-end accolades. Pohlad reiterated during a phoner that discussions about the release strategy were “ongoing” but they weren’t — Roadside had decided on a release date of 6.5.15.

Love & Mercy costars John Cusack, Paul Dano to left and right of Brian Wilson prior to 2014 Toronto Film Festival premiere.

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“It takes bravery for Kevin Costner and Mike Binder to go up against the strange phenomena of whites who no longer believe in themselves but assume guilt, and of blacks who assume entitlement. Both are typically disingenuous and untrustworthy progressive positions on racial problems, as in Selma. The title of Costner’s film makes a statement; yet, like Michael Jackson’s hit record, it also poses several questions: First about family, then character, then social values, and lastly about race. That may seem like backward priorities, given the way race has recently dominated film culture. But the order of the film’s interests suggests Costner’s integrity regarding showbiz moralizing.” — from Armond White’s 1.30 review of Black or White.

I’ve only seen American Sniper once, as part of an 11.11.14 double-header when Clint Eastwood‘s film was shown with Ava DuVernay‘s Selma. I’m mentioning this because today I spoke to Sniper‘s Oscar and WGA-nominated screenwriter Jason Hall following the Santa Barbara Int’l Film Festival writers panel, and he told me that the version I saw was a bit rough and incomplete and that a few slight trims were made for the final version. I resolved then and there to see it again, and soon. I was thinking about doing this anyway. Catch it with an audience of Average Joe ticket-buyers, I mean.

During this morning’s Santa Barbara Int’l Film Festival writers panel, held at the Lobero Theatre and moderated by Anne Thompson.

SBIFF writers panel moderator Anne Thompson, Imitation Game screenwriter Graham Moore, Theory of Everything screenwriter Anthony McCarten.

American Sniper screenwriter Jason Hall conferring with ten film students who are visiting SBIFF as part of Student Film Studies Program, launched this year by fest director Roger Durling

That’s me under the SBIFF projection inside Santa Barbara’s Lobero theatre. Pic snapped during this morning’s writer’s panel.

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I missed this four-day-old “Michelle Obama treated disrespectfully in Saudi Arabia” story due to being caught up in 18-hour-a-day Sundance madness. Many western women have declined to wear head scarves while visiting that country, but Saudi dignitaries refusing to shake the First Lady’s hand is fairly appalling.

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I absolutely agree that video stores, which are all but dead these days, improve a neighborhood’s atmosphere. An organic video store is as beneficial to an urban culture as an opera house, a nursery school, a storied cafe or hardware store. And so Annapurna producer Megan Ellison has therefore done a wonderful thing in helping to save Vidiots, the Pico Blvd. video store that’s been running since the mid ’80s. It was announced yesterday that Ellison has come to the assistance of co-owner Cathy Tauber, who had announced that Vidiots would close in April. That aside, I’ve had an attitude about Vidiots since something that happened in the late ’80s or early ’90s. I had rented a VHS of The Wizard of Oz and then lost the tape. Vidiots had sent me notices but I could’t find it. When it finally turned up weeks later they said I needed to pay them almost $200 in back rental fees. I thought it would be fair to charge me for the cost of the tape itself, which back then was in the neighborhood of $75 bills. (Less?) But no way was I going to pay them $190-something dollars. So we parted company and that was that. I’ve wandered into Vidiots five or six times since, but the vibe always seemed stuck in the ’80s with all those VHS tapes sitting on those highly-stacked shelves. The #1 rule applying to each and every business: “Adapt or die.”

“Boyhood’s alternate title might as well be Patricia Arquette’s Bad Choices. Mason’s life is shaped by her inability to stop herself from falling for abusive drunks, first a professor and then a soldier-turned-corrections officer. Neither man particularly cares for Mason, and Mason doesn’t particularly care for them.” — from a 1.30 essay by freebeacon.com’s Sonny Bunch.

“Boyhood‘s Patricia Arquette delivers a fine performance, although I didn’t care for her character subjecting her kids to not one but two abusive, alcoholic conservative assholes as stepdads. I’m a bigger fan of either Birdman‘s Emma Stone or A Most Violent Year‘s Jessica Chastain in this category. But the none-too-hip consensus gang decided on Arquette a long time ago.” — from 12.1.14 HE piece about the 2014 N.Y. Film Critics Circle winners.

I’m not saying I’ve spoken to anyone about J.C. Chandor‘s departure from Deepwater Horizon. Maybe I’ve just had a chat with myself. But the situation boils down to this: Lionsgate/Summit changed their minds about the kind of movie they wanted, and when they realized Chandor hadn’t changed his mind and was resolutely focused on the film he’d been talking about and planning to make for many months, they pulled the plug and reached out to Peter Berg, who has now lost whatever cred he had accumulated from directing Lone Survivor and is now back to being the hack who made Battleship.

Other Guy: “It was truly just a situation in which a filmmaker and a studio wanted to make two different movies. And you can probably tell from who Lionsgate hired what they wanted. It wasn’t some dramatic firing. Just a huge budget and two visions that weren’t the same.”

Me: “All that work, all those months of preparation…and suddenly there are two different versions? Chandor presumably wasn’t hiding his intentions over the last several months so either Lionsgate/Summit wasn’t paying attention all that time or they changed their minds.”

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Jennifer Aniston‘s people booked her for a 2015 Santa Barbara Film Festival tribute under an assumption that most of us had bought into by last November or thereabouts, which was that she would snag a Best Actress nomination for her deft and skillful performance as a chronic pain sufferer in Cake. Then, to everyone’s total surprise, she got elbowed aside by Two Days and One Night‘s Marion Cotillard. But Aniston did herself proud and perhaps even boosted her profile by projecting good sport vibes. Incidentally: I was late to last night’s Aniston tribute at the Arlington, but I didn’t have my SBIFF press badge plus the women at the door warned me that pretty much every seat was filled, etc. So I walked around with the intention of returning for the after-party, but I made the mistake of returning to my hotel room for a 15-minute nap (having been up since 4 am Santa Barbara time) and wham…woke up with the lights and TV on around 2 am.

Walking around Santa Barbara last night was pleasant enough if you wore a jacket or sweater. 19 year-olds were roaming around in shorts and T-shirts but I know they do that at least partly to irritate people like myself. I’m completely aware of the difference between warm vs. lukewarm vs. agreeably cool vs. chilly so don’t tell me. 95% of the women I’ve known will say it’s “cold” outside unless the temperature is well into the high 70s or 80s. All to say that the local night air definitely turns damp and cool after 9 and certainly after 10 pm, and yet the Santa Barbara Holiday Inn insists on keeping this beautiful Spanish-styled window open to the elements all night long.

Looking northeast out of the third-floor hall window inside the Santa Barbara Holiday Inn.

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