I’m still refining and cross-checking the numbers, but late last week American Gangster, which was three weeks away from its 11.2 release date, was tracking better than The Departed did two weeks from release. Thursday’s numbers (i.e., two days from now) will probably show a bump, but the huge numbers aren’t just from the male sector. Women, a bit surprisingly, are showing higher-than-normal awareness and interest levels. The definite interest is roughly 50% across the board, and in the vicinity of 60% for over-25 males.

Translated, this means the opening weekend should be in excess of $30 million. No scientific readings required — it’s merely the combination of eyeball-to-eyeball Denzel, bull-in-the-china-shop Crowe and the title. A portion of critics are respectful of Gangster but unsure of its Oscar prospects because it didn’t make them cry; presumably there are Academy and guild people who feel the same way. But reservations of this sort tend to melt away when big money is being made. Gangster‘s tracking, of course, doesn’t indicate “big money” — it promises a big opening weekend.

Manhattan hot-shot entertainment journo Lewis Beale says “it’s a terrific film, it has the best title ever, and if the crowd I saw it with at 84th and Broadway was any indication (very urban, very mixed demographically), it’s gonna get great word-of-mouth. If this isn’t a $100 million film, I don’t know what is.”

Who is the biggest piss-head critic around today? Somebody whose writing suggests that they scowl a good deal and are stingy with affection, who always seem to dissing this or that film for some arcane reason, whose views are so contrarian that you’ve almost come to hate him/her….and yet you read them anyway out of some perverse craving for adversarial drama?

N.Y. Press critic Armond White used to be the most flagrant in this regard, certainly the quirkiest and most strange, but I think the piss-head crown may have been snatched away by Slant‘s Ed Gonzalez. Are there others? Which critics seem to be levitating in a realm of their own creation with their backs arched like serpents, and which seem the most plain-spoken and least pretentious? I guess I’m asking for votes. I guess this is a kind of half-assed poll.

Listen for five or six seconds to the treacly, deeply patronizing narration in the trailer for Mike Newell‘s Love in the Time of Cholera (New Line, 11.16), and you know right off the top that Gabriel Garcia Marquez‘s respected romantic novel has been turned into something florid, unsubtle and aimed at women who didn’t graduate from college.

Javier Bardem in Love in the Time of Cholera

I’d been told it doesn’t quite work, but I still wanted to see it out of respect for Marquez’s reputation and for the great Javier Bardem, who plays Florentino Ariza. Then I saw the trailer and said to myself, “No way, not for me.” Why do marketing guys deliberately do this? Is it really necessary to turn off males in order to appeal to females? Here’s a pan by Slant‘s Ed Gonzalez, but Gonzales is a sourpuss — he always seems to be sneering at this or that film — so you can’t really trust him.

Meryl Streep will be honored at the 35th annual Film Society of Lincoln Center Gala Tribute on 4.14.08, or roughly 30 years after she first punched through with a strong supporting performance in The Deer Hunter. Streep occasionally perform in a dreary film, but she’s generally shown superb taste in picking films. Which is why I still find it mystifying that she’s starred in a film version of Mamma Mia, the Broadway hit musical that has has been a huge favorite of rube tourists since opening in 1999, selling well over 30 million tickets. Laurence Olivier needed money when he agreed to play “Zeus” in Clash of the Titans. What’s Streep’s excuse?

Director Susanne Bier, whose Things We Lost in the Fire opens this Friday, knows she’s not average or aspiring. She’s on it and she knows it. She didn’t say anything when we spoke this morning that betrayed this feeling, but I knew it was there. All serious artists have a fairly high opinion of themselves, and of course it’s the mediocre people who always say, “Who do they think they are? God?” The result is that when you talk to a serious artist, they’re always fountains of modesty.

Talking to this side of them is fine and relaxing, even as a voice tells you that the real creator — the miner, the re-arranger, the painter, the songwriter — is somewhere else. The cell phone Bier was talking from had crackly reception. I asked about attending the premiere (which happens sometimes this week) so I could take some pics, but the Paramount publicists were unresponsive. I’ll survive.

Jamie Stuart‘s third N.Y. Film Festival piece takes way too long to load…way. But once it’s up and running you can feel a Terrence Malick/Thin Red Line/”never met a leaf I didn’t like” influence.

The piece is mainly about leaves, water (dripping, ponds, gutter currents), ducks, construction scaffolding, the evident boredom on Tommy Lee Jones‘ face, the usual atmospheric space music, more construction sites, joiners, the evident boredom being felt by Jamie Stuart, bolts, wing nuts, plywood, shots of sky and clouds.

The best part is a one-on-one of Todd Haynes (director of I’m Not There) talking about capturing the style, mood and attitude of ’60s-era films and photography.

The official word from IMAX spokesperson Warren Betts: “There are no plans to release 2001: A Space Odyssey to IMAX.” Roger Ebert said last week that a 2001/IMAX release is “almost inevitable.” Warner Bros. to IMAX executives: “Forget it. We wouldn’t make back the money we’d spend on properly transferring the 70mm interpositive to IMAX. The world has moved on. Under 30s don’t know from Stanley Kubrick or monoliths or Johann Strauss. Releasing an IMAX version of the The Last Samurai, however, might work.”

It’s a good thing people like me weren’t notified of the Laszlo Kovacs tribute seminar until today. (Ray Pride‘s item went up Friday but it only made MCN’s front page a few hours ago.) If I’d known earlier others might have found out also and made plans to attend today’s gathering at the Chaplin Theatre at Raleigh Studios, at 3:30 pm. God rest the soul of the man who shot Five Easy Pieces, Paper Moon and Shampoo.

The shared mirth aside, what’s the most distinctive thing about this photo of Ethan Hawke, playwright Jonathan Marc Sherman and Josh Hamilton during a rehearsal for Sherman’s Things We Want, which begins previews at Manhattan’s Acorn Theatre on 10.22? For me, it’s the unattractive footwear. Hawke’s generic Foot Locker lace-ups with those lame white stripes on the side, Sherman’s chunky-soled construction boots, and particularly those godawful sandals worn by Hamilton that show his grotesque white feet, most notably his splayed, bony toes.

The most pronounced difference between boomer and GenX guys is that most boomers I know aren’t very big on wearing sandals anywhere except at the beach or at a picnic, and GenXers wear them just about anywhere, to anything. The idea that a fair percentage of men’s feet are fundamentally ugly or funny looking — an unwelcome sight for strangers — doesn’t seem to occur to under-40 types. Just as the idea of footwear that actually looks cool and elegant — shoes that might actually prompt a casual observer to go “whoa, nice” — has totally bypassed a good percentage of them.

This is a real generational dividing-line thing. Boomers are more partial to leather (loafers, lace-ups, boots), and are sometimes possessed of good taste in shoes and sometimes not. GenXers and GenYers share an almost uniformly atrocious taste in footwear — “affected” thick soles and conspicuous stitching, terrible color and design sense. In the warm months too many of them (guys in particular) walk around in dorky sandals, exposing without a hint of shame the most distasteful digits since the days of John the Baptist.

It used to be that only beatniks and hippies wore sandals. Uptown guys like Cary Grant and Dean Martin used to joke about the sight of them. Now sandals are legion in every town and city in the country. The idea of having to look at funny- looking feet is one reason I’m cool with working indoors a lot.

Some people (women especially) have nice-looking, even sexy feet. Maybe 15% to 20%, at best. But most people (particularly men) don’t, and those 80% to 85% really need to sit down and ask themselves, “Should I wear sandals to this thing I’m going to tonight?” The answer really needs to be no. Cover them up and keep them covered. For life. Please.

N.Y. Times columnist David Carr has delivered a frank, well-written examination of the facts driving the persistent rumors about the Weinstein brothers skating on thin financial ice.

Harvey and Bob Weinstein

“The Weinstein Company is still looking to acquire or produce something for small money and have it blow up huge,” he notes. “And for years, Harvey Weinstein was the first and last stop for indie hopefuls hoping to make it big. Now, there are a dozen or more companies, many staffed by people who broke in with the Weinstein-era Miramax, that are looking for the same thing.”

This is the essence of Harvey and brother Bob’s problem. They’ve been outflanked by competitors who know the game as well as they do, and who generally have smooth, agreeable personalities who seem (the “s” word being crucial) more likely to respect and listen to filmmakers, and who are thought to be more trustworthy (the “t” word being a flexibly defined term).

Harvey tells Carr “that even the box office losers will eventually perform because risk has been hedged and deals for international rights, DVD proceeds, and pay television one-offs will yield profits.

And at the Oscars, he expects The Great Debaters, a film directed by Denzel Washington and produced by Oprah Winfrey, and Grace Is Gone, a war-related film starring John Cusack, to be in the mix.” Hey, what about Cate Blanchett‘s Best Actress nomination for I’m Not There?

And “there are huge box office expectations around The Mist, another Stephen King project from Dimension,” Carr reports.

“But if the Weinstein catalog does not contain its share of winners, the value of the entire enterprise will be called into question. It is, in part, a self-created problem, with Harvey’s refusal to sit quietly while he built the company — by overpromising and underdelivering, he created a huge opening for a whisper campaign by his critics.

“There is a legion of competitors in Hollywood and New York who only tolerated Harvey Weinstein when he was on top and who are eager to do a happy dance on his company’s grave,” Carr observes.

Denzel Washington in The Great Debaters, a 12.25.07 Weinstein Co. release.

“[But] they should not put their hands in the air just yet. The Weinstein brothers have roared back to life more times than the average monster in one of Bob’s money-making horror movies. But they remain deeply challenged, with some big losses on big bets, antsy investors and a lack of bench strength in a world of competitors they helped train and build.

“That doesn’t mean Harvey is in danger of slipping below the surface — his backers have far too much at stake — but it could end up getting hotter in there still.”

I need to say this again because things like this need to be said as often as possible in this business. You have to do right by your friends. That doesn’t just mean you have to make money for them. That also means that when things go wrong you have to stand up and make them right. Are you listening, Quentin Tarantino?

The worst financial hit that the Weinstein Co. has suffered in recent months was due to the failure of Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez‘s Grindhouse. Harvey bears the primary responsibility, of course, but Tarantino and Rodriguez took him for a bath by spending their asses off on a film that should have been made on a shoestring, like the real grindhouse flicks of the ’60s and early ’70s were.

If I were Quentin I would feel guilty as hell about this, and I would try to make things right by being a man, stepping up and making a return of the Vega Bros. film — i.e., Pulp Fiction II — for Harvey for almost nothing, and a soon as possible. I would push out a good script if it killed me (the Vega Bros. return to the earth as ghosts?), and I would convince John Travolta and Michael Madsen to do it for a reduced fee with deferments and basically do everything I can to even the score.

I don’t know Tarantino, but I wonder if he’s even capable of considering this idea of trying to undo the harm done to the Weinstein Co.? Maybe he is. Maybe he’s making moves along these lines right now….but I doubt it.

I had a few problems with the first half of Gone Baby Gone when I first saw it three or four weeks ago. On top of which I was so whipped I had trouble keeping my eyes open. On top of which I had to be somewhere so I bailed at the one-hour mark, intending to catch it again in a more rested state. I saw it again last week and this time wide awake and right to the end, and it was a whole different deal.

Ben Affleck

I still have beefs, but the ending is quite strong — deliciously disturbing, I’d say — and in my book that’s almost the whole ball game.

For the finale alone, Gone Baby Gone is a first-rate drama. It’s also a formidable Boston crime film. The atmosphere is genuine, if not quite in the rich-underworld vein of Peter Yates‘ The Friends of Eddie Coyle. It’s a morally complex film that leaves you teetering on a seesaw with a shot of irony that doesn’t wash out, and in fact stays with you for days.

Ben Affleck has done a better-than-decent job in his maiden directing effort, and with the acclaim this film is already getting he’ll have gone a long way to erasing memories of his career-destroying relationship with Jennifer Lopez. He’s scored as a director, he can still work as an actor (as far as that goes) and he can kick ass any day he wants as a political commentator or candidate, even. He’s totally fine.

The best kind of endings build to a climax and drive their thematic point home clear and true. But a Gone Baby Gone-type ending — one that pulls you in conflicting ways with equal force, and both seeming like the “right” course — is nothing to snort at. It’s not quite up to the legendary ending of Eric von Stroheim‘s Greed, but it’s aiming at the same archery target. (And it hits it.) And if you ask me it packs a slightly stronger punch than the finale of Clint Eastwood‘s Mystic River.

Eastwood’s ’03 film shares two things with Gone Baby Gone. Both are based on Dennis Lahane novels, and both are about decent working-class Dorchester folks who’ve pretty much given up on the law and have decided to apply their own solution or justice when it comes to the fate of their children.

I’m not going to spill anything specific, but Gone Baby Gone is basically about a search for a 4-year-old Dorchester girl — the daughter of an empty, emotionally unstable floozie and coke addict (Amy Ryan) — who’s apparently been kidnapped, and a long search for the truth about what why she was taken, who took her and why.

The main problem, for me, is that Patrick Kenzie and Angie Gennaro, the neigh- borhood private detectives who are called in on the case, are played by Casey Affleck and Michelle Monaghan.

Their performances (especially Affleck’s) are solid, but there’s no buying a couple of actors who look like they’re in their mid to late 20s as case-hardened pros. Sorry, but I need to see people in their mid to late 30s (and looking it) playing these parts. (Affleck and Monaghan were 31 and 30 when they shot the film.) The movie tries to diffuse the issue by having a couple of characters say “how old are you?” to Affleck, but young is young.

(l. to r.) Affleck, Harris, Monaghan, Ashton

Plus there’s a difference between a whodunit being “complex” and verging into “what the fuck?” territory. Maybe I’m just not smart enough (I got a few As but mostly Bs in high school), but I was having trouble following some of the twists and turns. There’s a scene at a rock quarry that doesn’t make a lot of sense. (I’ve seen it twice and I still don’t know what happened.) My head was spinning during parts of the third act. Maybe Ben Affleck should have aped Clint’s Mystic River pace, or otherwise made it a little easier for dummies like myself to keep up.

Amy Madigan plays the aunt of the four-year-old who hires Kenzie and Gennaro. Morgan Freeman plays a police captain and Ed Harris and John Ashton are detectives involved in the case. Titus Welliver plays Madigan’s husband. Nobo- dy’s interest or agenda is quite what it seems at first, but then crime whodunits are always peeling away at the onion.

I say again that a movie that ends this well deserves an audience. For all the irritants, Gone Baby Gone needs to be seen and thought about afterwards. It’s unusual for a crime drama to leave you with this much moral aftermath. And all the hubbub about Casey Affleck’s performance is warranted. He acts and sounds like a real Boston slouch-around, and he almost overcomes the too-young issue because of it. Between this and his arresting turn in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, ’07 has been quite the year for him. Cheers.

Everyone enjoyed Manohla Dargis‘s Elizabeth: The Golden Age review than ran two days ago, but a big-city critic had this comment: “Do you think a male critic could have gotten away with that many references to female legs crossed, bosoms heaving and bodies quaking? What might the female equivalent of ‘smoldering slab of man meat‘ be, and could you publish it in the New York Times? A male scribe would have been called a perv and worse, methinks. The double standard lives!”