That deliberately degraded, snow-grained Blu-ray of William Freidkin‘s The French Connection is out today, and I’m searching for reactions from non-reviewers. You can’t trust regular DVD reviewers since they tend to bend over backwards to say nice things because they don’t want to alienate the folks who send them free copies. If anyone was dumb enough to buy this thing (as I was), please send along your reactions. You don’t have to hate it.

I was stunned when I noticed the absence this morning of David Jones‘ Betrayal, the notoriously missing 1983 adaptation with Ben Kingsley, Jeremy Irons and Patricia Hodges, among films that will compose a three-day Harold Pinter tribute at the American Cinematheque from 3.26 through 3.28.

I thought after Pinter’s passing that this captivating, jewel-like drama would at begin to turn up at special venues like the Cinematheque, at the very least. Even when a rights issue has prevented a DVD release of a film, the elite venues (AC, Aero, Film Forum, Film Society fo Lincoln Center, etc.) almost always manage to score a print for a single showing. But not this time.

Written by Pinter as a play in 1978 and then adapted for the screen three or four years later, Betrayal is easily the most elegant, accessible and well-liked Pinter movie ever made. It follows that any film programmer showing a series of Pinter films can’t exclude it without having to answer to guys like myself.

“Nothing Pinter has written for the stage has ever been as simply and grandly realized on the screen as [this],” wrote N.Y. Times critic Vincent Canby 26 years and 4 days ago. “I can’t think of another recent film that is simultaneously so funny, so moving and so rigorously unsentimental. The writing is superb, and so quintessentially Pinter that it sometimes comes close to sounding like parody, though, in the entire screenplay, there’s not one predictable line or gesture, the sort of thing that would expose the fake or the merely hackneyed. This is pure Pinter well served by collaborators.”

I’ve been ranting about wanting to see Betrayal on DVD for at least ten years. And yet no one in a position to explain the whys and wherefores has ever written or called. Nice.

This morning I wrote Chris, the AC programmer, and asked if he could help with info about who owns the prints and control the rights. The family of the film’s producer Sam Spiegel, perhaps? Spiegel died 24 years ago, and you know how weird and conflicted families can sometimes be about inherited assets.

“As you know, there’s no Betrayal DVD at all, and the film hasn’t been seen on video since ’84 when CBS-Fox put out a VHS version,” I wrote. “I find it mind-blowing that you guys weren’t able to at least score a print for a single showing. This means (a) there’s no decent-looking print anywhere and/or (b) whoever owns prints and the rights doesn’t give a hoot, hasn’t tried to preserve or restore the film, isn’t into the potential, etc.”

The three-day American Cinematheque program will show Pinter’s The Comfort of Strangers , The Homecoming, The Servant, The Caretaker, The Go-Between and The Pumpkin Eater.

“AmEx was shot and edited in a day and a half back in April 2006, as a sardonic response to the multitude of big-name filmmakers [Wes Anderson, etc.] appearing in American Express commercials. Three years later, with the collapsed state of indie film and the strangled economy/credit market, it seems more relevant than ever.” — Jamie Stuart.

AmEx (2006) from The Mutiny Company on Vimeo.

Is there any overlap between the folks who saw The DaVinci Code and are planning to see Angels and Demons (Sony, 5.15), and the ones who’ve seen or recently rented Bill Maher‘s Religulous and have maybe begun to consider or even accept his rational humanist views? The answer, I’m fairly sure, is somewhere between “very little” and “next to none.” And that, in a nutshell, is why things are as screwed up as they are right now.

(l. to r.) Ton Hanks, Ayelet Zurber, some guy and Ewan MacGregor in Ron Howard‘s Angels and Demons (Sony, 5.15).

Because as heartening as Barack Obama‘s election seemed to a huge number of us, it didn’t change the fundamental reality of where the vast majority of world citizens (i.e., the insufficiently educated, the flat-out ignorant) live in their heads. The intimidated and spooky-superstitious view of life still rules, and the Catholic Church (along with Islam) is one of the principal beneficiaries. You could also conclude, given this fact, that Ron Howard, Brian Grazer and Tom Hanks aren’t doing too badly either.

I know that if by clapping my hands three times I could (a) convert the world over to Bill Maher’s side of the issue and (b) eliminate the feelings of allegiance and submission that people offer daily to the Catholic church, I would clap my hands three times.

I get how religious orders and traditions that seemed to radiate some kind of divine aura when we were kids can continue to offer a kind of vague but spooky comfort to adults, even those that don’t believe in religious dogma. Moral order and moral discipline are essential for the survival of any civilized society, but the humanist basics — a belief in calm and decency and charity and kindness, and a respect for all tribes, beliefs, creeds and traditions that tend to their own and don’t advocate hate or cruelty or suppression of thought — weren’t invented by the Catholics, and in fact have been undermined by them in some cases.

It would be heavenly — I’m using this word deliberately — if people would just wake up and breathe in the good air and stand tall on their own, and in so doing pull the plug on the Catholic church now and forever.

That said, there’s nothing quite so dispiriting in the world of motion pictures as that glum and dutiful expression that Ewan MacGregor wears when he’s playing a character who’s part of a solemn order. He’s wearing this expression in every clip on the most recent Angels and Demons trailer.

We all know what this movie will be. The clips make it obvious. And we all understand it’ll clean up like the first one did. The question is why didn’t the trailer cutters include a line or even a word from poor Ayelet Zurer, the 39 year-old Israeli actress who plays Tom Hanks‘ “wing woman” (as Empire put it last week)?

Dan Brown‘s Angels & Demons is about a threat from the Illuminati, one of the Vatican’s ancient adversaries that still lives today in one form or another. Hank’s ‘symbologist’ Robert Langdon is hired by the Catholic higher-ups (including MacGregor’s character) to sift through the clues left by The Illuminati to find the “ticking time-bomb” they’ve planted under Rome.

The Illiuminati “have been dedicated since the time of Galileo to promoting the interests of science and condemning the blind faith of Catholicism,” the copy says. Sounds like a plan.

“I didn’t hate Watchmen, but I didn’t love it either,” says a longtime HE reader who managed to snag a ticket to the London premiere, which ended a couple of hours ago.

“I’m not a cinema snob and can take a decent loud popcorn film in my stride as much as an animated Israeli documentary or the latest from Shane Meadows. I read one early Watchmen review (if you can call it that — it was more of an ejaculation of words) that seemed to praise the movie purely on the basis that it existed, and that any fan of the comic books should be grateful that a movie of Watchmen simply exists.

“I don’t think this is good enough, and is definitely not the right attitude to take. I think anyone who sees Watchmen, whether a fan previously or not, [can’t help but] walk away disappointed that it didn’t live up to its potential.

“What I want more than anything in my popcorn movies is a bit of consistency. I’m led to believe that the big blue Dr. Manhattan is the only truly superhero in the film, but in that case, why are all the other Watchmen able to leap like agile cats and fight with the power of ten men? I understand that this is an alternate universe where Ozymandias is the smartest person in the world, but just because he’s pretty clever doesn’t mean it makes sense when towards the end of the movie he comes accompanied by a new breed of big Antarctic cat with huge fucking ears.

“All I ask for is consistency in the world which we are seeing, and the movie will work. If this stuff is going to make sense, that’s fine — explain it. Tell me why he has a big cat, don’t just throw it in there.”

This went right by me last month. The guy who plays George Lucas, I feel, is a deranged genius. From IFC’s The Whitest Kids You Know.

Is there any word on how the implosion of New Yorker Films will affect the U.S. release of Nuri Bilge Ceylan‘s Three Monkeys? Eugene Hernandez‘s Indiewire piece, posted four or five hours ago, doesn’t say if existing bookings will be honored or if someone other distributor will step in and take over. Here‘s my Cannes 2008 review.

Update: HE friend & correspondent Nick Dawson has been told that New Yorker “was handling the film as part of a service deal, so the release of the film won’t be affected by the shuttering of New Yorker Films. Apparently plans on a new release will be announced in the coming weeks.”

For most of his career John Cusack has focused on projects with a fair amount of integrity, so his agreeing to star in a self-produced lowbrow comedy called Hot Tub Time Machine certainly seems like a concession to the times. Straight paycheck, hold your nose, hunker down.

Michael Fleming‘s 2.23 Variety story says that Scott Heald‘s script is about a group of guys with the usual issues and complications in their lives returning to a ski lodge where they partied as teens, blah blah. They all find themselves in a hot tub — which happens to be a time machine — and get transported to 1987. Does this mean they get to meet up with their much-younger selves and…you know, offer advice about things they shouldn’t do when they get older?

A certain David Zucker protege was originally set to direct this, I’m told, but got dumped. Steve Pink will take the reins. (That name!) Cusack will costar with Rob Corddry and probably Craig Robinson and Clark Duke besides.

Production will reportedly start in Vancouver on 4.20. Cusack and New Crime partner Grace Loh will produce with Matt Moore.

Update: The original director attached to Hot Tub was Phil Dornfeld. He worked on at least one Scary Movie pic with Zucker as well as My Boss’ Daughter.

I’ve put some thought today into the Best Picture contenders as well as the apparent second-tier films, and almost no thought whatsoever into the other categories. I’ve mainly just copied and pasted and plopped them into the new 2009 Oscar Balloon. The refinement process begins now.

BEST PICTURE (21): Mandela/Playing The Enemy (Warner Bros.), d: Clint Eastwood; Biutiful (Universal), d: Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu; Nine (Weinstein Co.), d: Rob Marshall; Amelia (Fox Searchlight), d: Mira Nair; Green Zone (Universal), d: Paul Greengrass; Public Enemies (Universal), d: Michael Mann; Taking Woodstock (Focus Features), d: Ang Lee; Shutter Island (Paramount), d: Martin Scorsese; Cheri (Miramax), d: Stephen Frears; The Informant (Warner Bros.), d: Steven Soderbergh; Away We Go (Focus Features), d: Sam Mendes; Up In The Air (Paramount), d: Jason Reitman; The Hurt Locker (Summit), d: Kathryn Bigelow; An Education (Sony Classics), d: Lone Scherfig; The Lovely Bones (Paramount), d: Peter Jackson; Agora (no U.S. distributor), d: Alejandro Amenabar; The Road (Weinstein Co.), d: John Hillcoat; Brothers (MGM), d: Jim Sheridan; A Serious Man (Focus Features), d: Joel and Ethan Coen; Bright Star (no US distributor), d: Jane Campion; Julie and Julia (Columbia), d: Nora Ephron; The Tree of Life (no US distributor),d: Terrence Malick.

OTHER FORMIDABLES (15): Avatar (20th Cemtury Fox), d: James Cameron; Whatever Works (Sony Classics), d: Woody Allen; Men Who Stare at Goats (no US distributor), d: Grant Heslov; Leaves of Grass (no US distributor), d: Tim Blake Nelson; The Boat That Rocked (Universal), d: Richard Curtis; Dallas Buyer’s Club (Universal), d: Craig Gillespie; Untitled Nancy Meyers (Universal), d: Nancy Meyers; Ondine (no US distributor), d: Neil Jordan; Shanghai (Weinstein Co.), d: Mikael Hafstrom; Forgiveness (no US distributor), d: Todd Solondz; The Last Station (no US distributor), d: Michael Hoffman; Love Ranch (no US distributor), d: Taylor Hackford; Coca avant Chanel (Warner Bros.), d: Anne Fontaine; Nailed (Capitol Films), d: David O. Russell; Inglourious Basterds (Weinstein Co.), d: Quentin Tarantino.

PLUS (11): Lars von Trier‘s Antichrist, Cristian Mungiu‘s Tales From the Golden Age, Gaspar Noe‘s Enter the Void, a new Michael Moore documentary about profligate Wall Street bankers, Fatih Akin‘s Soul Kitchen, Michael Haneke‘s The White Ribbon, Jim Jarmusch‘s The Limits of Control, Ken Loach‘s Looking For Eric, Terry Gilliam‘s The Imaginarium Of Dr Parnassus, Andrea Arnold‘s Fish Tank; Jean-Pierre Jeunet‘s Micmacs a tire-larigot.

BEST DIRECTOR: Clint Eastwood (Mandela/Playing The Enemy); Rob Marshall (Nine); Mira Nair (Amelia); Paul Greengrass (Green Zone); Michael Mann (Public Enemies); Ang Lee (Taking Woodstock); Martin Scorsese (Shutter Island); Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu (Biutiful); Sam Mendes (Away We Go); Jason Reitman (Up In The Air); Terrence Malick (The Tree of Life); Kathryn Bigelow (The Hurt Locker); Lone Scherfig (An Education); Peter Jackson (The Lovely Bones); Alejandro Amenabar (Agora); John Hillcoat (The Road); Jim Sheridan (Brothers); Joel and Ethan Coen (A Serious Man); Jane Campion (Bright Star), Nora Ephron (Julie and Julia).

BEST ACTOR: Morgan Freeman (Mandela/Playing The Enemy); Daniel Day-Lewis (Nine); Javier Bardem (Biutiful); Matt Damon (The Informant/Green Zone); Viggo Mortensen (The Road); Leonardo DiCaprio (Shutter Island); Johnny Depp (Public Enemies); George Clooney (Up In The Air, Men Who Stare at Goats); Sean Penn (The Tree of Life).

BEST ACTRESS: Michelle Pfeiffer (Cheri); Carey Mulligan (An Education); Hilary Swank (Amelia); Rachel Weisz (Agora); Penelope Cruz (Broken Embraces); Saoirse Ronan (The Lovely Bones); Helen Mirren (The Tempest/Love Ranch); Gabourey Sidibe (Precious: Based on the Novel by Sapphire); Audrey Tatou (Coco Avant Chanel); Maya Rudolph (Away We Go); Meryl Streep (Julie & Julia).

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: Christopher Plumber (The Last Station); Matt Damon (Mandela/Playing The Enemy); Richard Kind (A Serious Man); Billy Crudup (Public Enemies); Mark Ruffalo (Shutter Island); Ewan McGregor (Amelia); Christian Bale (Public Enemies); Alfred Molina (An Education); Jamie Foxx (The Soloist); Kodi Scott-McPhee (The Road); Jonathan Groff (Taking Woodstock).

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Michelle Williams (Shutter Island); Sophia Loren (Nine); Imelda Staunton (Taking Woodstock); Mo’nique (Precious: Based on the Novel by Sapphire); Marion Cotillard (Nine/Public Enemies); Kathy Bates (Cheri); Judi Dench (Nine); Rachel Weisz (The Lovely Bones).

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY: Taking Woodstock (written by James Schamus, based on the book by Tom Monte); Nine (written by Michael Tolkin, Anthony Minghella; based on the novel by Arthur L. Kopit); Cheri (written by Christopher Hampton, based on the novel by Collette); Shutter Island (written by Brian Helgeland; based on the novel by Dennis Lehane); Mandela/Playing The Enemy (written by Anthony Peckham, based on the book “Playing the Enemy” by John Carlin; The Lovely Bones (written by Phillipa Boyens, Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh — based on the novel by Alice Sebold); Public Enemies (written by Ronan Bennett, Ann Biderman, Michael Mann — based on the book “Public Enemies: America’s Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-34 ” by Bryan Burrough); Amelia (written by Ronald Bass); Up in the Air (written by Jason Reitman; based on the novel by Walter Kirn);The Informant (written by Scott Z. Burns, based on the novel by Kurt Eichenwald).

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY : Up (written by Bob Peterson); An Education (written by Nick Hornby); A Serious Man (written by Joel and than Coen); Broken Embraces (written by Pedro Almodovar); Away We Go (written by Dave Eggars, Vendela Vida ; Biutiful (written by Amando Bo, Nicolas Giacobone, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu); Whatever Works (written by Woody Allen); The Hurt Locker (written by Mark Boal); The Limits of Control (written by Jim Jarmusch)

Jean-Marc Vallee‘s The Young Victoria, a period drama aimed at women who went to see The Other Boleyn Girl and Elizabeth: The Golden Age, may turn out to be more than it seems. But since it focuses on a romance between the young Queen Victoria (Emily Blunt) and a really fetching Prince Albert (Rupert Friend)…well, draw your conclusions. Opens a week from Friday (3.6) in England; undetermined release in the U.S. Costarring Miranda Richardson, Mark Strong, Paul Bettany.

Obviously a kind of Animal House by way of a true saga of British radio pirates in the mid ’60s, operating off a ship in the North Sea. The director-writer is Love Actually ‘s Richard Curtis, which, if you’ve seen Love Actually, could be a cause for slight concern among some of you. Opening in England only about six weeks from now, and then throughout Europe in April and May. Universal’s domestic release date is apparently up in the air.

The cast includes Bill Nighy, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Gemma Arterton, Emma Thompson, Kenneth Branagh, January Jones, Nick Frost and Rhys Ifans. Key marketing line: “These are the best years of our lives.”