Sometime in October Taschen is putting out a limited-edition $700 coffee-table book called Steve Schapiro, Taxi Driver. The title suggests a pictorial essay about Schapiro’s adventures as a yellow-cabber. It’s actually a collection of shots about the making of Martin Scorsese ‘s Taxi Driver (’76), which Schapiro served as the unit photographer for.

The only non-muted color shot I’ve ever seen of a blood-soaked Robert De Niro at the end of Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver.

The coolest shot by far on the website is the one of DeNiro’s Travis Bickle as he lies on the tenement couch at the end, mimicking a suicide shot into his left temple. As everyone presumably knows this image has never before been seen in full color due to Scorcese having toned down the blood to sepia brown in order to get an R rating.

Taxi Driver‘s Wiki page recalls that “in later interviews Scorsese commented that he was actually pleased by the color change and he considered it an improvement over the originally filmed scene, which has been lost. However, in the special edition DVD, Michael Chapman, the film’s cinematographer, regrets the decision and the fact that no print with the unmuted colors exists any more, as the originals had long-since deteriorated.”

“The whole conviction of my life now rests upon the belief that loneliness, far from being a rare and curious phenomenon, is the central and inevitable fact of human existence.” — Thomas Wolfe, “God’s Lonely Man.”

N.Y. Times guy Michael Cieply has posted an 8.21 piece about Facebook management being mildly angry about The Social Network‘s unflattering depiction of founder Mark Zuckerberg, as portrayed by Jesse Eisenberg. I haven’t seen the film but I’ve read the script, and Zuckerberg comes off as a manic, brilliant and opportunistic asshole — and yet fascinating for that. I don’t want to shock anyone but successful guys can be selfish dicks, and some nice guys actually do finish last.

(l.) Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg; (r.) Jesse Eisenberg as Zuckerberg in The Social Network.

Zuckerberg and friends, concerned about Facebook being indirectly tarnished or made to seem like a slightly dicey environment, have, according to Cieply’s article, decided to ignore The Social Network. But they’ve also told Cieply that some or much of the film is made up.

This may be the case to some degree. Movies tend to exaggerate retellings of true-life stories for dramatic emphasis, and…like, whatever, Francis Bacon wasn’t a naturalist. Welcome to the art world. People want strong points of view, and basically to see the non-provocative stuff pruned down so the provocative stuff can be savored all the more, and so the core issues confronting characters can be addressed in some detail. Didn’t William Shakespeare play more or less by these rules?

And didn’t Zuckerberg create this issue in the first place by declining to talk to Ben Mezrich, author of The Accidental Billionaires, which Aaron Sorkin based his Social Network screenplay upon to some extent? If Zuckerberg had spoken to Mezrich instead of blowing him off, he would have most likely been portrayed more sympathetically. If you’re a serial killer of small children, you’ll come off a bit more sympathetically than not if you talk to the author who’s writing about you. It works this way every time.

It felt calming to sit on the cool grass at last night’s Alamo Drafthouse Rolling Roadshow screening of On The Waterfront in Hoboken. The weather was perfect and the stars were out, and the soundtrack, at least, was damn near perfect. I could hear every vowel and consonant spoken by Marlon Brando, Eva Marie Saint, Rod Steiger, Karl Malden and Lee J. Cobb.

A Waterfront image shown last night on Hoboken’s Pier A, projected at 1.85:1.

But the projection, sad to say, was close to horrific. Hundreds of movie lovers turned out to witness a ceremonial tribute to a great film, and the Drafthouse guys couldn’t be bothered to respect appropriate projection standards. Nice.

The same scene on the Waterfront DVD, which is presented at 1.37:1.

Instead of showing this 1954 classic at the proper 1.66:1 (or 1.37:1) aspect ratio, the Alamo guys showed it at 1.85:1, which lopped off huge portions of the top and bottom of the frames. On top of which the focus was almost comically soft. It was like watching a film underwater but without goggles. And the screen wasn’t properly anchored so river breezes caused it to billow every now and then.

And of course, the audience just sat there, content or complacent or happy just to be outdoors and lying on the grass. As I was, but c’mon. Most people are sheep when it comes to projection standards.

I spoke to the projectionist, a 30-something guy who didn’t seem to know all that much and was basically going “who, me, what?” I told him I’d worked as a projectionist years ago and that I knew from aperture plates, and that he was ruining the vibe by showing Waterfront at 1.85:1. (He was projecting actual film, by the way — I had expected a digital show.) I told him I’d seen Grover Crisp‘s Waterfront restoration in a screening room, and that it should be shown at either 1.37:1 or 1.66:1, but that going with 1.85:1 was vandalism. The guy was obviously no aspect-ratio fanatic. “Huh?”

There was a pre-gathering at The Dubliner starting around 6 pm. Sports writer Benn Schulberg, son of Waterfront screenwriter Budd Schulberg, spoke about his dad, the film, Brando, and director Elia Kazan. James T. Fisher, author of On The Irish Waterfront, an account of the real-life Waterfront history and the filming in Hoboken, also spoke.

Benn Schulberg speaking at The Dubliner — Friday, 8.20, 6:55 pm.

I asked both these guys if they had any inside info about a Waterfront Bluray eventually coming out. “Bluray?” I also asked if they knew of a really detailed On The Waterfront location website. They didn’t. They were also more interested in talking to the women at the gathering (especially a certain leggy blonde) than to me. A Hoboken Chamber of Commerce rep named Gerry Fallo said there’s a guy named Lenny Luizzi, a longtime Hoboken resident, who sometimes takes visitors on Waterfront location tours. His email is movielen@aol.com. Here’s an article about him. And here’s another.

This video clip mainly shows Fisher delivering remarks, starting about 95 seconds in:

Eat Pray Love hasn’t done very much since opening last weekend. It’s not being totally ignored but it is kind of piddling along with revenues diving from seven days ago and an apparent $36 million cume after eight days. And I’m a little surprised. I’ll bet a lot of people are. This was supposed to have legs and not drop all that much, but it fell 57%. I’ll bet Julia Roberts is looking at the numbers this morning and saying to herself, “Well, I’m proud of what we did, however much money it makes.”

I know the willingness to see EPL among somewhat older women, particularly among those who either hadn’t read the book or who don’t go to films that much (or both), was there. I spoke to three or four older women who all said “this I’m going to see!” And what happened to all the ladies who did buy Elizabeth Gilbert’s book (and in some instances read it more than once), and who were expected to come out in droves and bring their friends and then go to restaurants in groups of four and five and talk it over and drink wine and shriek with laughter?

I know for a fact that Eat Pray Love is reasonably decent in sections, and that Richard Jenkins delivers in that one Indian rooftop scene, and that Javier Bardem charms and really acts, and that the Rome/India/Bali footage is certainly beautiful, and that it unfolds like a class act with some really nice Neil Young music on the soundtrack…so what happened?

Is it that Roberts’ character seems a little too stuck on herself and her issues? That she seems out of touch with ground-level concerns? Or is Roberts herself simply over as a box-office attraction (which is also what people were saying after the fizzle of Duplicity)? Or is it that the film, while agreeable here and there, simply didn’t provide what female moviegoers wanted?

Vampires Suck, one of those silly, blink-of-an-eye distractions that nobody cares or thinks about, is #1 so far with $5 million earned yesterday, a projected $14 to $15 million by Sunday night and a five-day cume of $21 million. Boxoffice‘s Phil Contrino says “there’s no way Vampires Suck will be #1 this weekend. We’re estimating $4.24 million yesterday and $12.8 million for the weekend. The Expendables will easily be on top by Sunday.”

And yet as we speak Sylvester Stallone‘s actioner is down 64% from last weekend’s opener, and is in second place so far with $4.8 million yesterday. I’m looking at $14.5 million for the weekend and a grand cume of $62.7 million. So…what, it might limp to $80-something million by the end of the run?

The third-place Lottery Ticket, another nothing movie, did about $3.7 million yesterday for an approximate $11 million by Sunday night.

Eat Pray Love, not bad in my book but clearly not igniting with the general populace, is down 57% from last weekend’s opener with $3.6 million yesterday, a little more than $11 million for the weekend and a $36 million cume, give or take.

Piranha 3D — can you imagine actually saying to a friend, “Hey, let’s go see Piranha 3D“? — will come in fifth with 3.6 million yesterday and a possible $10 million for the weekend. The sixth-place Nanny McPhee has sputtered — $3 million yesterday, maybe $9 million by Sunday night. The Other Guys is down 47% for $2.9 million yesterday, possibly $9.5 by Sunday night — whoa, it could wind up beating Nanny McPhee and Piranha 3D!

Jennifer Aniston‘s girly-girl fans didn’t come out for The Switch — $2.8 million yesterday, $8 million for weekend and a #8 slot. But she’s loaded and has a great ass (really) and is probably vacationing in Barbados as we speak.

Inception is #9 for a $2.1 million Friday, a $7 million weekend and a grand $261.2 million cume.

The tenth-place Scott Pilgrim vs. The World is an absolute corpse — $1.5 million yesterday (down 65% from last weekend), $4.5 million for the weekend and a $20.2 million cume.

The first thought when I saw this one-sheet this afternoon was how much better it is — more crackling, intriguing — than Arthur Penn‘s 1965 film. I would give this poster at least an 8 or an 8.5, and the film a 5…okay, maybe a 6. What other one-sheets seemed to deliver more than the films they were selling? Nearly all of the Saul Bass one-sheets for those 1950s Otto Preminger films, surely. The Man With The Golden Arm one-sheet is several artistic realms above the movie. Others? There must be dozens.

I have to leave for Hoboken and an outdoor screening of On The Waterfront by the Alamo Drafthouse‘s Flying-Fuck-at-a Rolling-Donut Travelling Picture Show…or whatever it’s called. It’s happening on Pier A right off Frank Sinatra Drive at 8 pm, and I’ve also been invited for drinks at a bar beforehand so I’d better shag ass.

Joe Baltake says he’s “weary of the ‘strong strain of misogyny’ (Kim Morgan‘s apt expression, from her Sunset Gun site) that seems to routinely follow Jennifer Aniston in film review after film review (written mostly by snarky young critics). I find Aniston to be a reliable actress, a terrific comedienne, a most companionable screen presence and, by all accounts, a very generous co-worker. It’s gotten out of hand. So, fed up, I posted something.”

I’ll tell you what’s wrong with Aniston. She specializes in making mediocre movies. She’s really not that great an actress. She doesn’t tremble with soul. And she keeps bopping around from one guy to another. Never settles down, no babies, no laying down of roots, no standing up for the dolphins (like Ben Stiller does), nothing deep or risky. She just seems to glide along and be content with being herself and being rich and having a great ass. Other than that I’m sure she “plays a helluva game of golf,” to steal a line from Paddy Chayefsky‘s The Hospital.

I saw this New York magazine cover last night in a news store on Third and 69th, and decided then and there this is undoubtedly one of the coolest things Katie Holmes has done in any realm or arena. And it’s meaningless — the wearing of clothes, simulating a famous photo, and so what? Nothing at all. But it’s close to perfect.

Another thought is how free-spirited and alive to mood and possibility and aroma Mrs. Onassis seemed this particular day. She’s obviously gone now but the idea of being gone couldn’t have been further from her mind the second that Ron Galella snapped this shot. It’s like that for all of us. New York street life can be rude and noisy and glorious, and one day you’ll be dead as Dillinger…believe it. As Jack Nicholson said in The Departed, “Act accordingly.”

I was just told that the director of a film I’ve recently seen and greatly admire currently lives in Rochester, New York. The second I heard this his stock immediately dropped. If you’re a serious director you can’t live in Rochester. I’ve been there and it’s absolute Nothingville — sprawling, architecturally bland if not ugly, economically depressed, living in the past (when Eastman Kodak was a booming company), overrun by corporate chain stores, schlubby fat people shuffling around, older cars everywhere, gun stores, yahoos with sideburns, etc.

The world is full of wonder and intrigue and immense beauty, and I can’t help but suspect that directors who seem to go out of their way to avoid this are, no offense, a little strange. Directors can live any damn place they choose — in the wilds of Montana, San Francisco, Austin, London, New York, Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, Vancouver, Croton-on-Hudson, New Mexico, western Massachucetts, southwestern Ireland, France, Brooklyn, northern Vermont, Italy, Sydney, Mendocino, New Orleans, Barbados, Chicago, Los Angeles and dozens of other cool places. But you can’t live in end-of-the-world Rochester without making people who’ve had a little education and experience go “what“?

In an 8.18 interview with Christiane Kubrick, the 78 year-old widow of Stanley Kubrick, Guardian contributor Jon Ronson reveals what seems to me like an exceptionally sad fact. Vivian Kubrick, 50, who played “Squirt” in 2001: A Space Odyssey and who shot that Making of ‘The Shining’ doc, succumbed to Scientology about a decade ago, and now her mother considers her “lost.”

Vivian Kubrick about 10 years ago, and during her bush-baby scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

“She was hugely loved, and now I’ve lost her,” Christiane says. “You know that? I used to keep all this a secret as I was hoping it would go away. But now I’ve lost hope. So. She’s gone.”

“It all began, she says, while Stanley was editing Eyes Wide Shut, which starred Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. Stanley asked Vivian to compose the score, but at the last moment she said she wouldn’t. Instead, she disappeared into San Francisco and Los Angeles. ‘They had a huge fight,’ Crhistiane recalls. ‘He was very unhappy. He wrote her a 40-page letter trying to win her back. He begged her endlessly to come home from California. I’m glad he didn’t live to see what happened.’

“On the day of Stanley’s funeral, Christiane says, ‘Vivian arrived with a woman nobody recognized. She just sat in Vivian’s room. Never said hello to us. Just sat. We were all spooked. Who was this person? Turns out she was a Scientology something-or-other, don’t know what.’

Scientology “is [Vivian’s] new religion,” Christiane explains. “It had absolutely nothing to do with Tom Cruise by the way. Absolutely not.”

“I think she must have been very upset [by her father’s death],” Christiane says, “but, again, I wouldn’t know. I know nothing. That is the truth. I can’t reach her at all. I’ve had two conversations with her since Stanley died. The last one was eight years ago. She became a Scientologist and didn’t want to talk to us any more and didn’t see her dying sister Anya, didn’t come to her funeral. And these were children [who] had been joined at the hip.”

The following portion of Ronson’s interview stopped me short: “[Christiane] says that when Stanley was alive, he kept her and their daughters cosseted from stress, from life’s legal and financial arrangements, allowing them to float through Childwickbury without worries.”

Let me explain something. If anything is going to interfere with the ability of a younger person to cope with life as they begin to make their way on their own, it is having been “cosseted from stress” and shielded from “life’s legal and financial arrangements” as a child.

Parents believe that allowing a child “to float through” his or her early life “without worries” is a profound expression of love. It is in fact one of the worst things you can do to a son or daughter. I know three or four people who lived somewhat shielded lives as children, and now they could arguably be called hiders in one way or another. They aren’t unhealthy or uninteresting people, mind, but they seem to have sought to recreate that sense of being “sheltered from the storm” that they knew during childhood. The strongest people tend to be those who’ve experienced a little up and down and rough and tumble in their formative years. Like me.

My understanding is that Christian Alvart‘s Case 39 was shot in ’06. This is indicated by the fact that Bradley Cooper, whom I’ve totally written off since The A-Team and his sickening appearance on the last MTV Movie Awards, has his chubbier face — i.e., the one he had in The Wedding Crashers, before he buffed up in order to look like a smokin’ hot movie star.

One might think that the combination of (a) the three-year delay and (b) Renee Zellwegger‘s presence would be more than ample reason to stay away from this. For me Chubby Cooper seals the deal. Is that thoughtful? Have I not read comments that Case 39 is better than its reputation indicates?