In the opinion of The Page‘s Mark Halperin, “One of the best-written (and delivered) speeches of the campaign.”
In the opinion of The Page‘s Mark Halperin, “One of the best-written (and delivered) speeches of the campaign.”
MSNBC Kentucky exit polls from yesterday, passed along by Mark Halperin‘s The Page: 78% of Clinton’s supporters with were 65 and older. 78% were described as “rural whites.” 74% were described as “non-college-educated whites.” 69% were described as “unhappy with the idea of a black guy in the White House.” Kidding about the last one, but not really.
Kentucky voters were also asked by MSNBC “which candidate best resembles your skin color, and therefore shares your values? Clinton tallied 73% and Obama got 47%. Kidding again, but not really.
“When Changeling was translated into French as L’Echange, many folks liked The Exchange better. Director Clint Eastwood was noncommital at the press conference, but [producer Brian] Grazer thinks it will stay Changeling in the U.S.” — from Anne Thompson‘s Variety column, posted a little while ago.
If Grazer “thinks” it will stay Changeling, that means he’s not 100% sure, which means the title is in play. I think The Exchange mildly sucks myself. It sounds dry and underdescriptive — close to meaningless . It suggests an allusion to some sort of financial-barter transaction rather than a switch. And even something that clearly refers to one young boy replacing another doesn’t sound right to me, having now seen Eastwood’s film.
Changeling without a “The” is probably the one to stick with.
“One under-estimated factor is the nature of Mrs. Clinton’s ambition. As her life has progressed from those salad days at Wellesley, her own long march through the institutions has been fraught with awful moral compromise. In this campaign alone, the pacts she has made with various devils to keep ahead of the pretender to her throne have been particularly brutal.
“Somewhere in her head, she justifies all the principles she has trashed over the years, all the enemies she has allied with, all the racists she has won over, all the abused women she has smeared…on the grounds that if she becomes president, the good she can do will outweigh it all.
“These are the sacrifices all people who seek power for the good must undergo, she tells herself. To have it all taken away from her at the last minute — by someone who hasn’t made as many compromises — is therefore unimaginably cruel. She cannot accept it because her life’s work is at stake. So she struggles on. Her private life, her marriage, is fused with her public life. So she has nowhere else to go. Which is why she stays. This is all there is for her.
“Is that crazy? I don’t know. But it is immeasurably sad. Not sad enough for pity. She did this all herself. But sad nonetheless.” — 5.20 entry from Andrew Sullivan‘s Daily Dish blog.
I was going to tap out a glowing review of Terence Davies‘ Of Time and the City, a spiritual lament about the director’s hometown of Liverpool. It’s a sublime marriage of poetry, archival footage, snippy social criticism, and nostalgia for a lost and irretrievable past. It hits you gently and yet powerfully. Especially if you have a feeling for the fraying of social cohesion and family structure that has happened everywhere since the ’50s.
Davies — short, bespectacled, pinkish complexion, gleaming white hair, traditional black tuxedo — took a bow before last night’s 10 pm showing at the Salle du Soixantieme. One of his producer pals said on the mike, “He’s back…and he’s beautiful.”
And like I said, I was going to write about it…but the line for the 11:30 showing of Clint Eastwood‘s Changeling/The Exchange — 85 minutes from now! — is already getting pretty long so I’d better get down there. Why don’t people just hang back and wait until 10:45 or so to line up? Who wants to wait in line this long?
“Exclusive! Indiewire’s Eric Kohn texts from the premiere of Raiders of the Lost Ark!” — written by eFilmCritic’s Rob Gonsalves. Funny stuff.
Variety‘s Anne Thompson is reporting that the “buzz is good” on Benicio del Toro‘s performance as Che Guevara in Steven Soderbergh‘s The Argentine and Guerrilla, which will show in tandem in Cannes tomorrow night. A guy who’s seen both films told me last night that Del Toro’s performance is so intense he’s “almost scary.”
I’ve heard two other things — one from a journalist with a contact who’s seen it, and a director who gets around and tends to hear pretty good stuff. The journalist claims that Guerilla gave his friend “the feeling of ‘why am I watching this?” — the guy having enjoyed The Argentine much more. The director says he’s been told that Guerilla is the far superior of the two.
“I gotta give it up — as earnest and awkward as Two Lovers — a loose rethink of Dostoevsky’s White Nights — can get, it frequently moved me,” writes Some Came Running‘s Glenn Kenny. “Perhaps it’s something to do with my own past as a fall-hard guy for troubled, difficult women. Then again, a lot of my male colleagues not giving this movie any love have similar skeletons in their closet.”
Having made perhaps too many thoughtful political-minded films that haven’t made money, John Cusack is taking his agent’s advice and plunging into Roland Emmerich‘s 2012, an apocalyptic thriller for Columbia Pictures. Redbelt star Chiwetel (“Chewy”) Ejiofor is also planning to join the big-budget epic, whose title refers to the end days of human civilization as foretold by the ancient Mayan calendar, blah blah. Variety‘s Tatiana Siegel reports that the screenplay was cowritten by Emmerich and Harald Kloser. Harald?
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