Last night a friend wrote to complain about a line in the intro copy for the latest Oscar Poker podcast, to wit: “Sasha admits that Donald Trump MAY be a sociopath, but still thinks democrats are worse.”

My friend was mostly enraged by the “may” qualification apparently. Sasha and I have long agreed about many, many things, but not about The Beast. When she mentions him I usually just sidestep or change the subject. Yesterday, however, was a breakthrough moment when she acknowledged that he’s a sociopath.

I don’t dictate opinions to Sasha, I replied. I can only say what I think, which generally falls in the realm of sensible center-left territory. I thought it was a significant thing, however, when Sasha allowed that Trump is a sociopath, which she’s never admitted to before. The next step is admitting that he’s basically a crime-family felon — an authoritarian, uncivilized, intolerant, anti-Democratic ruffian.

She added the “and Democrats are worse” part to the intro copy. I’ve never tried to instruct Sasha about what to think or write. It’s not my style. Anyway…

“Sasha was a progressive pro-Hillary lefty before the pandemic,” I explained. “And it’s fair to say, I think, that not all right-of-the-spectrum types are necessarily evil. Position-wise and sensibility-wise Sasha isn’t all that different than Bill Maher or Dave Chappelle. Recently the pro-Israel Sasha has also express disgust about some of the more adamant pro-Hamas sentiments on the left, but who isn’t on that page?

“And you know what else? She hates it when Hollywood wokesters gang up and vote to purge and destroy iconoclasts like me, and for the last few years she’s long been an excellent friend and devoted ally in this regard.

“All in all I’m guilty of nothing worse than being an alleged ‘asshole’ of sorts…of venting opinions that the Stalinists don’t approve of…being a nervy, big-mouthed devotee of a certain late 20th Century and early 21st Century liberal aesthetic, and of being devoted to hundreds upon hundreds of great films. But there’s a whole Millennial-Zoomer gender-pronoun sector out there that wants me shunned and dismembered because they want anyone who doesn’t parrot basic woke-think doctrine…not that bad if you don’t listen to guys with H.R. Geiger Alien acid in their bloodstream like Glenn Kenny.

“Part of this animus, I’m imagining, is due to my admiration of Woody Allen and Roman Polanski.

“You should try being un-person-ed by the woke crazies and go-along cowards. It’ll have an effect upon your thinking, trust me.

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I’ve said hi or bumped into Al Pacino 10 or 12 times over the decades, and he’s never been anything but calm, gracious, open-hearted and generally accomodating. Key quote regarding his occasionally florid acting style, which kicked into gear after Scent of a Woman: “I don’t mind ham as long as it ain’t spam.”

@ringwalkmedia12 Pay $25 and get to see Al Pacino! Boom! Beverly Hills tour produced! #moviestar #alpacino #hollywood #beverlyhills #usa #fyp #viral #viralvideo #viraltiktok ♬ original sound – Ringwalkmedia12

Israel's president @Isaac_Herzog in our interview: „Only now we got the note that Shani Louk has been confirmed as murdered and dead. They found her skull which means these barbaric sadistic animals simply chopped off her head.“ pic.twitter.com/BKttGyS0TU

— Paul Ronzheimer (@ronzheimer) October 30, 2023

Israel’s President Yitzchak Herzog has confirmed that the German-Israeli citizen Shani Louk has been found beheaded. “Her skull was found…that means those barbaric, sadistic animals simply chopped off her head,” Herzog has told BILD. (http://on.bild.de/BILDinfo / Datenschutz: http://on.bild.de/DSE)Barbarism

Prof. Victor Davis Hanson, 70, is obviously not a wokester, and that’s an excellent thing. He’s a sensible, articulate, well-educated guy who cares about responsible civic consciousness and American history and our Democratic institutions, etc. I ignored this YouTube ad the first few times that it played while I was doing something else, and then I began to actually listen to it.

Wiki bio: “Hanson is an American classicist, military historian, farmer, and political commentator. He has been a commentator on modern and ancient warfare and contemporary politics for The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, National Review, The Washington Times, etc. He’s a professor emeritus of Classics at California State University, Fresno, the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow in classics and military history at the Hoover Institution, and visiting professor at Hillsdale College. Hanson was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2007 by President George W. Bush, and was a presidential appointee in 2007–2008 on the American Battle Monuments Commission.”

Now that Israeli troops have invaded Gaza and the brutal stuff is about to commence (and God help the Gaza residents caught in the crossfire, not to mention all the Israeli and American hostages), I’m expecting to see some serious handheld, you-are-there, Robert Capa, cinema verite, Gillo Pontecorvo Battle of Algiers footage from brave journalists….none of that long telephoto lens chickenshit stuff. Get out there and risk your lives and get that footage, or fly home.

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Oscar Poker heartache is right here for the listening.

All hail Poor Things, which is basically a hipper, cooler, more baroquely imaginative and definitely a more sexual version of Barbie…basically Barbie meets a British-stamped, Victorian-era Fellini Satyricon but with similar feminist use-your-girl-power content.

Okay, Hollywood Elsewhere is looking to add a little extra income….big deal, right? I’ll be adding other features as things progress within the next couple of weeks…yeah, man. Again, here’s the link.

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For nearly three decades I’ve felt dazzled by the main title sequences in David Fincher films. The awesomely jittery Se7en credits, the black-ink-flooding-a-keyboard sequence from The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, the cool and slick-feeling Zodiac and Social Network credits…always with a pizazzy, ahead-of-the-curve quality.

Same deal with The Killer‘s high-velocity credit sequence. The names and credits appear with a weird angle and fly by so quickly they barely have time to register. They happen so fast you’re going “wait…what?”, and then it’s off to the races. And it’s great.

I tried to snag a copy of this sequence over the weekend but failed. It’ll be viewable when The Killer starts streaming on 11.10, of course, but if you catch it in theatres try and pay close attention. It may be my second-favorite Fincher credit sequence of all time. (Sorry but the schizophrenic Se7en credit sequence, assembled by R. Greenberg & Associates, is still in first place.)

From Owen Gleiberman‘s “Is Leonardo DiCaprio Playing a Dumb Hick, a Pitiless Sociopath…or a Muddle?,” posted on 10.29:

“In Killers of the Flower Moon, Leo’s Ernest Burkhart feels less like a character of dark or even tragic impulses than like a man who, in any given scene, is what the film needs him to be.

“When he’s asked to do the ultimate dark deed — to add poison to the insulin shots his wife is taking — he carries out the task with such methodical thoughtlessness that instead of the heart of darkness opening up before us, we may feel like we’re seeing the heart of darkness closed off. Our connection to Ernest as a character should be deepening, but instead we’re on the outside looking in. Can a man slow-kill the wife he loves, without a shrug, all because he’s a dunce yokel following orders?

“There’s a disorienting lack of background to much of what takes place in Killers of the Flower Moon. Like how Robert DeNiro’s William Hale brought this scheme of organized murder into being. How Hale himself, a public friend and benefactor of the Osage, evolved into a genocidal terrorist is never even addressed — his terse heartlessness is presented as a fait accompli. And Ernest Burkhart’s compliance in the scheme is presented with the same quality of rote objectivity. It’s as if they’ve all been doing this their whole lives.

“The film is scrupulously true to the terrible facts of the Osage murders. Yet the answer to the ‘why?’ of how the Reign of Terror happened — that these men were heartless racists — is an accurate answer that still doesn’t always feel like a dramatically full answer.

“As we watch Mollie waste away, Lily Gladstone acts with a sorrowful bewilderment that haunts us, but the fact is that Killers of the Flower Moon is a movie that asks us to spend three-and-a-half hours in the shoes of her affectless deceptive scoundrel of a husband, who by the end we may feel we understand less than we did at the beginning.”

I respect Minnesota Congressperson Dean Phillips‘ intention to run against Joe Biden in New Hampshire and perhaps beyond. I admire his courage in speaking out (a lot of people are angry at him for doing this) and openly sharing his fears about Biden’s electability and trying to goad others into challenging Biden also.

He’s honestly concerned about Biden’s numbers being too low, which they are. He’s genuinely concerned that Trump might prevail in ’24. Plus he’s thoughtful and well-spoken.

But Phillips isn’t high-profile enough to launch a credible New Hampshire challenge, and he’s not good-looking like a movie star. His eyes are too small and beady-ish, and his nose is bigger than Bill Maher’s. But I’m glad he’s doing this regardless. At least someone on the Democratic side is trying to shake things up.

Imagine being a fly on the wall during the writing of Five Nights at Freddy’s (Blumhouse/Universal, 10.25). Pic was co-written by direcor Emma Tammi, Seth Cuddeback and original videogame creator Scott Cawthon. Imagine the odious cultural devolution required for this to happen, and then imagine the torrents of cash. Five Nights at Freddy’s has opened with a $78M haul — the second biggest opening ever for a videogame pic. Super Mario Bros ($146.3M) it still first in this regared, and Sonic the Hedgehog 2 ($72M) is third.

Pic stars the too-short Josh Hutcherson as a troubled security guard who takes a night-time job at an abandoned family entertainment center, after which four animatronic mascots come alive and are prone to murder. Costarring Lizabeth Lail, Piper Rubio, Mary Stuart MastersonMatthew Lillard.