The window of a westbound New Jersey Transit train, covered in grease and slime…you can hardly see through it. The maintenance of Metro North trains is much more disciplined. Don’t even mention European trains in the same breath.

I’m still really angry at those Cannes critics who dismissed or otherwise pooh-poohed Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire‘s Black Flies. It’s nothing phenomenal or earth-shattering, but is bruisingly efficient and sufficiently good for what it is — a jarring, hard-hitting, you-are-there NYC paramedic trauma film.

Black Flies occupies the same general atmospheric turf as Martin Scorsese‘s Bringing Out The Dead (’99), which of course was critically praised because critics know they’re obliged to give any Scorsese film the benefit of the doubt and then some.

If Scorsese had never made Bringing Out The Dead but had produced and/or collaborated to some extent on Black Flies, Cannes critics — almost all of them fickle, posturing snobs — would have been much more supportive.

I don’t know if Alberto Barbera will invite Woody Allen‘s Coup de Chance to the 2023 Venice Film Festival or if Woody will choose to premiere it at the San Sebastian gathering…

But given an apparent consensus that Allen’s latest is a respectable, noteworthy film and possibly his best since Match Point, and possibly his last film (who knows?), I’m very sorry for the domestic political quagmire in this country…a political reality that will most likely prevent Coup de Chance from playing the domestic early fall film festivals (Telluride, Toronto, New York).

The Cannes board allegedly said no to Thierry Fremaux about potentially debuting Coup de Chance in Cannes for the same reason…no berth for a filmmaker whom the #MeToo scolds have been labelling as persona non grata for several years now.

Even the most enlightened film programmers — those who believe in simply screening the best available choices of the moment, and who aren’t beholden to woke Stalinism — have no realistic choice in the matter, politically speaking. I feel for their situation as it’s a very difficult call all around. I feel very badly for everyone caught in this mishegoss.

The recently unveiled French-language trailer announces that Coup de Chance is opening in French-language territories on 9.27.23. As we speak no U.S. distributor has found the balls to release the film stateside. It goes without saying I would love to see Coup de Chance play Telluride ’23, but of course it won’t.

Finessed synopsis: “Fanny (Lou de Laage) and Jean (Melvil Poupaud) are an ideal couple: financially flush and professionally fulfilled, they live in a magnificent apartment in [one of] the high-end districts of Paris and seem to be as in love as [they were on] the first day they met.

”But when Fanny crosses, by chance, Alain (Niels Schneider), a former high school friend, she is immediately hooked. They see each other again, and, very quickly, get closer and closer…”

A couple of months ago I reported about an early April screening of Coup de Chance in Manhattan. Resturateur Keith McNally and columnist Roger Friedman raved.

Coup de Chance dp Vittorio Storaro quoted by Jordan Ruimy’s World of Reel by way of Italy’s quotidiano.net:

“I am scandalized and indignant that Cannes has chosen not to present [Woody’s] latest film, all because of the accusations made by his wife Mia Farrow and her daughter Dylan. Need I remind everyone that Woody has already been acquitted of these charges twice? This #MeToo obsession continues [to our general misfortune]. Yes, it is bringing real systemic issues to light, but it’s also doing a lot of unjust damage. It’s a witch hunt that goes beyond the bounds of common sense.”

Big 6.12 announcement: The Golden Globe awards will continue, but no longer under the aegis of the long-belittled, self-satirizing, now-disbanded Hollywood Foreign Press Association.

The Golden Globes brand has been bought by Todd Boehly‘s Eldridge Industries and Penske Media’s Dick Clark Productions. The slip-slidey HFPA no-accounts will continue to collect salaries for the next two or three years, but have essentially been shown the door.

And yet, from the perspective of Joe and Jane Popcorn, nothing will really change. The Globes will continue to serve as a warm-up awards show for the Oscars, and the award recipients will continue to enjoy a certain award-season heat. The only difference is that the show will henceforth be produced by a fresh gang of hustlers.

From a 5.10.21 HE piece called “Golden Globes Castle Is Collapsing“: “Nobody loved the HFPA dilletantes before — they were ‘tolerated’ in a shoulder-shrugging, eye-rolling sense of that term, and now distributors and talent are saying ‘okay, fuck these guys…even with the announced reforms they aren’t woke enough, not by 2021 standards, and now, trust us, they’re about to understand the cost of their terrible folly.’”

I love Brooks Barnes‘ opening paragraph from his 6.12 N.Y. Times article about same:

More from the 5.10.21 piece:

From a 1.8.23 HE piece about the ongoing Golden Globe collapse:

For their latest Oscar Poker chit-chat, Jeff and Sasha wade in the waters of The Idol, Rock Hudson: All That Heaven Allowed, Woody Allen’s Coup de Chance and its almost certain exclusion from domestic film festivals, Sasha’s late reaction to Air, the still unexplained French Connection / William Friedkin censorship thing, the Kate Hepburn and Arnold Schwarzenegger docs, etc. We recorded a few hours before the announcement of the tragic motorcycle death of Treat Williams…condolences.

Again, the link.

LETTER FROM HE to WES ANDERSON, SENT AT 4:55 PM EASTERN:

Wes,

When filmmakers and actors have lately (i.e., since 2017) been accused of unsavory off-screen behaviors, it’s become the fashion for colleagues to throw them under the bus and run for tall grass.  Sadly, deplorably.

Example:  Timothee Chalamet‘s chickenshit response following accusations of Woody Allen‘s long-refuted issues with Mia and Dylan after starring in Allen’s A Rainy Day in New York.

I therefore genuinely admire your reply to questions about allegations of questionable behavior on the part of Bill Murray during the filming of Aziz Ansari‘s Being Mortal. Hats off, crisp salute.

Jeff

Excerpt from 6.12 IndieWire piece by Samantha Bergeson, titled “Wes Anderson Is Standing by Bill Murray Amid Sexual Misconduct Claims Against The Actor“:

“Asteroid City filmmaker and frequent Murray collaborator Anderson told IndieWire’s Eric Kohn that the allegations against Murray will in no way impact their working relationship:

“My experience with Bill is so extensive. Bill was such a great supporter of me from the very beginning. I don’t want to speak about somebody else’s experience, but he’s really part of my family. You know, he’s my daughter’s godfather. In fact, he actually baptized her. He’s the one who splashed the water.”

For the first time, you might want to listen to a drag queen. pic.twitter.com/o2r9jbbUak

— Dr. Anastasia Maria Loupis (@DrLoupis) June 12, 2023

A new expression entered my vocabulary yesterday — “hate-eating.” That’s when you’ve ordered something you really don’t like but you eat it anyway because it would be too much toil and trouble to send it back. That was me yesterday, sitting inside the Spicy Moon cafe and eating the worst-tasting vegetable dumplings I’ve ever had in my life. I wrote yesterday that they tasted like “hot mashed-up Brussels sprouts and filled with a kind of seaweed green gloop.”

HE commenter Zoey Rose: “Seriously Jeff, look for the things you enjoy [and] not the things you hate. Time on this planet is winding down so why not find pleasures in life instead of being the epitome of the cliched old fart complaining about kids,” blah blah.

HE to Zoey Rose: “Speak for yourself regarding the ‘winding down’ of time. Nothing’s winding down on this end, I can tell you. And what do you know of the future, by the way? About as much as anyone else does, which isn’t much except for generalities.”

If there’s one serving of advice I have consistently rejected and in fact despised all my life, it’s “invest in love rather than disdain,” “glass half full rather than half-empty,” “always look on the bright side,” etc.

Do you think Mark Twain or George Orwell or Paul Morrissey ever bought into that happy-faced crap?

I’ve always looked at things as they are or seem to be, and free of vibes of forced smiley-face happiness or rose-colored glasses or any of that jazz. Life is not Disneyland.

Yesterday’s world of the streets of the Lower East Side — warmer than warm, in some ways bland, shade-less, somewhat sticky and certainly dreary — was what it fucking was. It was certainly no cultural blessing to be there, I can tell you. The architecture mostly lacked intrigue and character, certainly compared to the nabes of Paris, Rome, Prague, Bern, Barcelona, Cefalu, San Francisco, etc.

Manhattan has always been a must-to-avoid on summer days. Stay the hell out of town until after Labor Day. They’ve all said that for decades. Nothing cranky about it — just the way it is.

I wrote about the Lower East Side yesterday with exactly the same spirit and attitude with which I wrote about Buenos Aires 18 years ago, in March 2005.

Posted on 2.3.22: “Sometime in 2009 or ’10 I was seated next to Morrissey at a Peggy Siegal luncheon in some plush Manhattan eatery. I recognized him right away, but even if I hadn’t I would’ve felt instantly at home with the sardonic attitude and the seen-it-all, slightly pained facial expressions. I love guys like this. They’ve lived long enough and have met enough people of consequence to know that much of what constitutes modern life (even in a first-class town like New York City) is distasteful or disappointing or phony. And yet they soldier on with their squinty smiles and witty asides.”