I know that look on Leonardo DiCaprio’s face — as Ernest Burkhart, the bad-guy nephew of Robert DeNiro’s William Hale character in Martin Scorsese and Eric Roth’s Killers of the Flower Moon, he’s projecting a lowbrow dumbfuck attitude, a little hostile and guarded, probably not enough brain cells, etc. Born in 1874, Hale wasn’t that … Read more
The great actor, producer and director Norman Lloyd passed earlier today at age 106. I was so taken by his performance as a blind but very skilled English professor in Curtis Hanson‘s In Her Shoes that I asked to chat with him. Two encounters happened, both in September ’05. We did a phoner, and then … Read more
Originally posted on 11.26.11: Speaking of miserable, I was at one of my lowest ebbs in the late summer or early fall of ’78. I was living in a roach-infested Soho tenement on Sullivan Street and writing reviews for free, pitching freelance articles to people who thought I was marginally competent as a writer (if … Read more
As previously noted, a Paramount Home Video Bluray of Francis Coppola‘s re-jiggered 1990 family crime saga pops on 12.8.20 — just under three weeks hence. Repeating: The primary problem with The Godfather, Part III, which nobody ever liked and which is still regarded as the dishonorable bastard child of the Corleone saga, is that it … Read more
10 or 15 years ago I was fencing my way through an annoying discussion. It was for a film-related story about something or other, and the guy I was talking to was being “evasive” — sidestepping, playing dumb, pretending he didn’t know or understand, etc. At one point the evasive guy said he needed to … Read more
I’ve said this once or twice before, but the primary problem with The Godfather, Part III, which nobody ever liked and which is still regarded as the dishonorable bastard child of the Corleone saga, is that it didn’t respect the established arc of its main character. Al Pacino‘s Michael Corleone was a somber, soft-spoken, cold-hearted … Read more
On 10.4 I posted a Best Supporting Actor riff titled “Mahershala Ali Again. Really.,” which advanced the notion of a second Best Supporting Actor Oscar for the Green Book co-star. On 10.26 I posted another called “Mahershala Ali Kick-Ass Syndrome,” which noted that 15 out of 25 Gold Derby “experts” had put Ali at the … Read more
I saw and reviewed Rebecca Miller’s Arthur Miller, Writer (HBO 3.19) last November. The HBO premiere happens on 3.19. In recognition of a just-posted trailer, my reactions once again: “This is a highly personal project by respected director Rebecca Miller, the playwright’s daughter by his third wife. I’ve admired Miller and his plays all my … Read more
I’ve seen Arthur Miller — Writer, an intimate, not-uninteresting, years-in-the-making portrait of the late playwright. Scheduled to air on HBO next spring, the doc is a highly personal project by respected director Rebecca Miller, the playwright’s daughter by his third wife. I’ve admired Miller and his plays all my life, but the doc acquainted me … Read more
If, as the head of Lucasfilm marketing, I’d been recently ordered to come up with a title for Ron Howard, Kathy Kennedy, Phil Lord and Chris Miller‘s Han Solo film, I would have left work early on Friday. The idea would have been to withdraw from the hurly burly and think long and hard. I … Read more
I’m kind of fed up with traumatic recovery movies. Hard-knock tales about the resilience of the human spirit, I mean. Protagonists walloped and nearly destroyed by some godawful tragedy only to gradually fight their way back to a semblance of a normal life. And so I sat down to watch David Gordon Green and Jake … Read more
I have two questions about the firing of Phil Lord and Chris Miller off the Han Solo spin-off. One, why did producer Kathy Kennedy wait four and a half months to cut them loose with the film having begun shooting in late January or thereabouts? And two, what does it say about Kennedy’s hiring instincts … Read more