A month and half ago Fox 411’s Roger Friedman wrote that several sources had told him that Paramount Pictures was negotiating with the Cannes Film Festival organizers to show Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull as the opening-night attraction, and now a 4.5 Screen Daily report says that Crystal Skull costar John Hurt has told BBC talk-show host Jonathan Ross that “we will be opening the film at the Cannes Film Festival.”

Fantasy Moguls‘ Steve Mason is reporting a higher weekend figure for Martin Scorsese‘s Shine a Light — $2.15 million — than what I’ve been told it’s likely to be, which is something in the vicinity of $1.4 million. Even if Mason turns out to be right, it’s still lower than it should be. You can use terms like “limited success” or “IMAX hit,” but the bottom line is that it fizzled. And nobody under 40 cared what the boomer-aged critics had to say.
If Fox Searchlight’s Young @ Heart, which is also about performing rock standards, is the year’s most heartwarming film, Shine a Light is easily ’08’s most purely enjoyable — rousing, beautifully shot and cut, clap your hands and say yeah. And yet it didn’t do very well outside the IMAX theatres. The reason, of course, is that the Stones don’t mean much to younger GenXers and GenYers. It’s an older person’s rock concert film. The excitement, the charged energy levels and the Stones’ sublime aura of authority are transcendent — it’s one of the best films of this type ever made — and younger moviegoers didn’t want to know.
Jett saw it with a date in Syracuse last night (i..e, the flat version — no IMAX in Syracuse) and says he was mainly taken with the great photography and the editing. He said he didn’t like Mick Jagger showing his stomach (I argued with him about this) but said he was gratified that his forearms were more muscular than they seemed to be during th Stones’ half-time Superbowl performance in Detroit two years ago.

I’d like it known that as I tapped out yesterday morning’s box-office report, I considered and discarded the use of the word “fumble” in describing the opening- weekend performance of Leatherheads. Fair warning — anyone who uses this or any other football term (tackled, thrown for a loss, field goal) in their box-office summary stories will be facing a slight blowback factor.

Two or three days ago I passed along that comment about Sean Penn being “so great” in Gus Van Sant‘s Milk (i.e., from an actor-director friend with reliable early-buzz connections),and thereafter concluded that Milk could be regarded, if you’re into mindless spitballing, as the #2 contender for the ’08 Best Picture Oscar, right behind David Fincher‘s The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

The only thing that scares me about Milk is Van Sant himself, which is to say my uncertainty about who he is or wants to be right now. The c.w. is that there have been three significant Van Sant phases thus far — (a) the assured street-poet chapter that included Mala Noche, Drugstore Cowboy, My Own Private Idaho, To Die For and Good Will Hunting, (b) the misguided, bordering-on-deranged ’98 to ’00 period when he made the Hitchcock-aping Psycho and the repulsive Finding Forrester, which led to a kind of spiritual withdrawal-or-collapse, and (c) the verite rebirth period, lasting five years so far, consisting of raw, deconstructed extended-take art films — Gerry, Elephant, Last Days and Paranoid Park.
If Van Sant who made Drugstore Cowboy is making Milk, terrific. If a blend of that Van Sant along with the guy who made Elephant is directing Milk, beautiful. But if the Finding Forrester Van Sant is anywhere near the Milk set, watch out.

Three or four recollections about Charlton Heston, who passed this evening at age 84 after grappling with Alzheimer’s Disease for the last six years or so. In such a condition, departure for realms beyond is not the worst option.

(1) I saw Heston speak at a black-tie dinner at the Beverly Wilshire maybe nine or ten years ago. He didn’t carry a cane but he could barely walk — he was just shuffling along. I considered him a kind of enemy at that point because of his support of the NRA but my heart went out when I saw what lousy shape his legs were in. That brawny muscular guy in the loincloth who played oar-rower #41 in Ben-Hur had become a frail old coot in a toupee. What a rotten thing it is to suffer the infirmities of age.
(2) His best screen moment happened in the last act of The Big Country, when his ranch-hand character in The Big Country decides to abandon a short-lived ethical mutiny against his ruthless employer, played by Charles Bickford, and follow him into Blanco Canyon and an almost-certain gun battle to the death. When the rest of the hands who had briefly sided with Heston catch up and join them, Heston looks at Bickford with utter revulsion, in part because he knows he can’t defeat him but mainly because he’s come to hate himself.
(3) The best story he ever told was when Ben-Hur director William Wyler spoke to him in his dressing room after the first or second day of shooting and said, “Chuck, I’ve thought about your performance over the last couple of days and you’re going to have to be better.” Sure, Willie, said Heston — just tell me what you want, what to do. “I can’t say exactly because I don’t know,” said Wyler. “I just know you have to be better.” And then Wyler said “see ya” and left the room. Heston said something about pouring himself one or two stiff ones and taking a long walk.

(4) Heston should have shown more humanity about gun laws in the wake of the Colombine shootings. He and the NRA should have thought more carefully about gun users being tested for a license, and about the proliferation of automatic weapons. If there was such a thing as answering for your sins at the gates of paradise, right about now St. Peter would definitely be asking Heston to join him on a nearby park bench and explain the gun thing.

In my very limited readings and discussions about David Fincher‘s The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which is certainly, I’ve begun to tell myself, a formidable contender for the ’08 Best Picture Oscar, it never hit me that Eric Roth‘s original March 2005 script is 205 pages long. I’m sure it’s been compressed and pruned down, like any other script that goes before the cameras, but it does seem as if the final film, which comes out 12.19, has a chance of being on the longish side.

“The decision to go to war should be a simple decision. It should be based on whether or not a President is willing to send his own son to war. If he isn’t, how can he send the sons of others?” — former Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura, speaking on CNN within the last 24 hours. The thinking here is too simplistic to be called truly wise or perceptive, but I respect it. You can’t be too thread-county in your moral-political evaluations. You have to be willing to listen to Jesse Ventura-type guys, and give them their just due.

It is unattractive for any writer to use the word “I” with any constancy, not to mention unwise and unpersuasive. But this 4.6 N.Y. Times article by Matt Richtel is unmistakably and unavoidably the life of yours truly. Reading it ten minutes ago was the heaviest Roberta Flack “Killing Me Softly” moment I’ve experienced in a very long while.

4.5.08, 6:55 pm

“A growing work force of home-office laborers and entrepreneurs, armed with computers and smartphones and wired to the hilt, are toiling under great physical and emotional stress created by the around-the-clock Internet economy that demands a constant stream of news and comment.
“it is unclear how many people blog for pay, but there are surely several thousand and maybe even tens of thousands.
“Of course, the bloggers can work elsewhere, and they profess a love of the nonstop action and perhaps the chance to create a global media outlet without a major up-front investment. At the same time, some are starting to wonder if something has gone very wrong. In the last few months, two among their ranks have died suddenly.
“Two weeks ago in North Lauderdale, Fla., funeral services were held for Russell Shaw, a prolific blogger on technology subjects who died at 60 of a heart attack. In December, another tech blogger, Marc Orchant, died at 50 of a massive coronary. A third, Om Malik, 41, survived a heart attack in December.
“Other bloggers complain of weight loss or gain, sleep disorders, exhaustion and other maladies born of the nonstop strain of producing for a news and information cycle that is as always-on as the internet.
“To be sure, there is no official diagnosis of death by blogging, and the premature demise of two people obviously does not qualify as an epidemic. There is also no certainty that the stress of the work contributed to their deaths. But friends and family of the deceased, and fellow information workers, say those deaths have them thinking about the dangers of their work style.
“The pressure even gets to those who work for themselves — and are being well-compensated for it.
“‘I haven’t died yet,’ said Michael Arrington, the founder and co-editor of TechCrunch, a popular technology blog. The site has brought in millions in advertising revenue, but there has been a hefty cost. Mr. Arrington says he has gained 30 pounds in the last three years, developed a severe sleeping disorder and turned his home into an office for him and four employees. ‘At some point, I’ll have a nervous breakdown and be admitted to the hospital, or something else will happen.’
“‘This is not sustainable,’ he said.
Even as I read this, I am thinking about the four or five stories that I’ve outlined but haven’t yet written as part of today’s quota. There is no release from this because I can’t imagine not doing it. I feel I have to or else. I know if I don’t I’ll pay the price very soon. The trick is to get beyond feeling this way (the exhaustion and lethargy comes and goes like seasons or rainstorms or Jewish holidays) and flip it over and enjoy it like a pool or a hike or a weekend softball game. The Richtel piece, obviously, is sobering. How could it not be?
But no more sobering than reading statistics about cancer deaths when I was in my early 20s and smoking a pack a day. I did my first quit when I was 24 or 25. It was the first of at least ten attempts that happened on and off for the next 15 years. But I got there.

Every so often, sometimes inadvertently, movies comment about themselves. Sometimes amusingly, sometimes not. In George Miller‘s The Road Warrior, you’re expected to chuckle when the Humungous says after lots of high-velocity mayhem, “There’s been entirely too much violence.”

Keanu Reeves (center) in David Ayer’s Street Kings (Fox Searchlight, 4.11)

In Chapter 27 , the recently-released drama about the build-up to the killing of John Lennon by Mark David Chapman (Jared Leto), it’s hard not to smirk when Leto, speaking in a strongly actor-ish southern drawl, says he can’t stand movies in which actors seem to be showing off.
Another such moment happens in David Ayer‘s Street Kings (Fox Searchlight, 4.11) in which someone — Keanu Reeves or Forest Whitaker, I forget which — says, “Too many guys have been shot.” Which, from my perspective, was certainly one of the problems with the film, if not the problem. Few things irritate me more than a crime film with an excessive body count. It’s not an absolute law, but it tends to be true more often than not: the less gunshots a crime thriller has, the better it tends to be.
I don’t know for a fact that Street King‘s co-screenwriter James Ellroy has problems with it also, but telling L.A. Times staffer Scott Timberg, in a 4.6 article about his relationship with Hollywood, that he wouldn’t discuss it certainly indicates a reservation or two. Ellroy shares screenplay credit with Kurt Wimmer and Jamie Moss. If I were a betting man, I’d wager that Ellroy isn’t much for accomodating himself to the views and visions of others.
There may be several crime thrillers that have worked just fine with gunshots galore, but I can’t think of any right now. Back in the ’70s and ’80s the prevailing rule was that any crime thriller with a big car chase was definitely suspect, and quite possibly bad. (Because a film looking to ape the legendary car chases in Bullitt and The French Connection always seemed to be doing just that.) Too much burned rubber = a lack of style and imagination.
One more thing: when Forest Whitaker is a good film, like The Crying Game or The Last King of Scotland or The Great Debaters, he’s a champ and a prince. But when he’s in a bad or problematic one, like Street Kings or Vantage Point or Species, he seems to almost make it somehow worse.
Maybe it’s because Whitaker is such a committed whole-hog type who’s intensely into whatever he’s acting. Put him in a crummy film and he always seems to be saying to the viewer, “Man, I’m not gonna rest or hold back until you understand — completely, totally, without a doubt — that this movie I’m acting in right now is pretty damn awful. I’m not gonna leave you alone about this. I’m gonna hammer and hammer and make it hurt. You will be in pain by the time I’m finished with you.”

An “amazing gathering of film luminaries” are attending a weekend of mourning in and around London for the late director Anthony Minghella. A three-hour Catholic service was held this afternoon St. Thomas More church in Swiss Cottage, a suburb of London. Elegant and heartfelt words were spoken about Minghella by Talented Mr. Ripley costars Matt Damon and Jude Law, English Patient author Michael Ondaatje and costar Juliette Binoche, and Minghella’s producing colleague Harvey Weinstein (who also delivered a message on behalf of the ailing Sydney Pollack, who was Minghella’s producing partner).
Dominic Minghella (the director’s brother), Cold Mountain costar Renee Zellweger and Truly Madly Deeply costars Alan Rickman and Juliet Stevenson also attended. Gordon Brown and Tony Blair, the present and former Prime Minister of the UK, were there as well. Ditto widow Carolyn Minghella, daughter Hannah Minghella, an exec at Sony, and son Max Minghella, an actor.
Also attending was Richard Curtis, who recently collaborated with Minghella on the screenplay of The #1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, which was partly shot in Botswana. Bishop Trevor Mwamba, an Anglican bishop from Botswana who met Minghella during the shooting of Detective, spoke at length, and cathartically. John Seale, who shot English Patient and Ripley, was there. Ditto producer Saul Zaentz, editor-producer Walter Murch (who came from Argentina, where he’s working with Francis Coppola on Tetro), and Working Title honchos Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner.
There was a big Minghella dinner party last night at the Groucho Club, a ilm-industry watering hole on Dean Street in Soho. Harvey Weinstein is giving a dinner as we speak at Lucio’s restaurant.

In its second weekend, Robert Luketic‘s 21 has dropped only 30% and will be the weekend’s #1 film. It’s expected to do roughly $16,634,000 by Sunday night.
Tracking had indicated George Clooney‘s Leatherheads, which opened nationwide yesterday, would earn something in the $15 to $20 million range, but it will only make $13,845,000 for the weekend. Something happened out there, enthusiasm didn’t build, people had second thoughts or actually read reviews. (Time for the Saturday morning tut-tutters to write in and say if I knew how to read tracking I would have known all along that Leatherheads was a shortfaller waiting to happen.)
Nim’s Island, a family film that opened yesterday, will be the #3 attraction with roughly $12,500,000…decent. Dr. Seuss’s Horton Hears a Who is fourth with $7.5 million. The Ruins, which opened yesterday, is fifth with a projected $7.5 million, give or take. Superhero Movie! is off over 60% from last weekend’s debut with a projected $5.2 million. Drillbit Taylor is seventh with $3.5 million. Tyler Perry’s Meet the Browns will end up with roughly $3.2 million by Sunday night. Shutter will be ninthg with $2.9 million and 10,000 B.C. will be tenth with $2.7 million, give or take.
On the limited opening front Wong Kar Wai’s My Blueberry Nights, playing on six screens, will take in about $81,000 total, or $13,000 a print. And Martin Scorsese‘s brilliant Shine a Light, which I saw a second time last night at the Universal Citywalk IMAX, is only going to make about $1.3 million on roughly 350 screens, which translates to roughly $4000 a print. The IMAX theatre I saw it in last night was close to capacity. Go figure.