[Initially posted on 9.24.20] A couple of days ago screenwriter Daniel Waters asked followers to post four or five films that they deeply admire or feel guilty-pleasure pangs for, but which are generally regarded as insufficiently loved.

Five films, in short, that the hoi polloi never seemed to care very much for (or never knew much about or have forgotten) but which you privately swear by.

Five years ago I posted a list of HE’s 160 greatest all-time films , but none apply here because each is loved and respected. We’re talking lone-wolf, off-in-the-corner films. So here are five…make it six picks:

Sandra Nettlebeck‘s Mostly Martha (’01). Probably the greatest sensual foodie + unlikely love affair flick I’ve ever seen. Martina Gedeck and Sergio Castellitto‘s lead performances are perfection. Scott Hicks‘ No Reservations, an American remake costarring Catherine Zeta Jones and Aaron Eckhart, missed the mark.

John Flynn‘s The Outfit (’73). A classic hard-boiled revenge film, lean and blunt and crafted in the tradition of Point Blank. Outside of noir cultists and film bums, few have paid much attention. Robert Duvall, Karen Black, Joe Don Baker, Joanna Cassidy and Robert Ryan.

Bob Rafelson‘s Stay Hungry (’76). Love, character, destiny, Southern culture and body-building. Charming, low-key, funny. Arguably contains the most winning Arnold Schwarzenegger performance ever. Definitely my all-time favorite Jeff Bridges film. Sally Field, R.G. Armstrong, Robert Englund, Helena Kallianiotes.

Frank Perry and Thomas McGuane‘s Rancho Deluxe (’75). Another Jeff Bridges film about destiny and character, this time by way of Montana cattle rustling. Harry Dean Stanton and Richard Bright played Curt and Burt, and of course their names are a running gag. Not a lot of narrative urgency, but that’s also the charm of it.

Lamont Johnson‘s The Last American Hero (’73). One of the best redneck flicks ever. Yes, Bridges again. The story of racecar driver Junior Johnson, called Elroy Jackson in the film. Based on Tom Wolfe‘s Esquire piece titled “The Last American Hero Is Junior Johnson…Yes!”.

Susanne Bier‘s Things We Lost In The Fire (’07). My all-time favorite film about drug addiction, containing my favorite Benicio del Toro performance. Fans were few and far between when it opened in ’07, but I was instantly sold. Alone but hooked,

I half-liked the first John Wick flick, but I hated the two that followed. I might watch John Wick: Chapter 4 (Lionsgate, 3.24.23) because of the locations — Paris, Berlin (including Studio Babelsburg sound stage interiors), osaka and Lawrence of Arabia‘s Wadi Rum.

I’ve just finished reading the delicious opening chapter of Quentin Tarantino‘s “Cinema Speculation.” It’s called “Little Q Watching Big Movies,” and it has a great recollection of what it was like for seven-year-old Quentin to watch John Avildsen‘s Joe (’70), and especially how audiences loved Peter Boyle’s titular character — not loved by way of admiration, but because Joe, low-rent doofus that he was, occasionally expressed popular rage about this and that cultural issue.

I’m going to post a chapter excerpt but first a Boyle obit that I posted a day after his passing on 12.12.06 — nearly 16 years ago.

“Thanks to reader Tommy Matolla for sending along a photo of Peter Boyle as campaign manager Marvin Lucas in Michael Ritchie‘s The Candidate (1972) — my all-time favorite Boyle performance.

“When I heard of Boyle’s passing this morning I thought immediately of how superbly on-target he was as the guy who managed, manipulated and mind-fucked Bill McKay (Robert Redford) in his California campaign for the U.S. Senate. Well-mannered and nicely dressed in a trimmed beard and glasses, Lucas was a sly politico with a cynical heart and a whatever-works attitude, and Boyle’s air of witty refinement surprised a lot of people given his then-current rep as a thuggish meathead type — due, of course, to his breakout performance in John Avildsen‘s Joe (’70), in which he played a hippie-hating blue-collar oaf.

“And yet Boyle also portrayed Lucas with a subtle (and in my view, quietly hilarious) comedic edge. He delivers each line with total sincerity (as far as it goes) but at the same time lets the audience know that Boyle knows that Lucas is partly a practical pro with a job to do, and partly a user-faker. It was this performance, I think, that made people realize he was much more than a one-trick pony. On top of which few seemed to understand when it first opened that The Candidate was a very dry comedy — every scene has an oblique comic thrust.

98% of the public thought of Boyle as the cantankerous Frank Barone in Everybody Loves Raymond, which ran from ’96 to ’05 (while providing Boyle with much financial comfort) but his glory period was from ’70 to ’76: Joe, The Candidate, Steelyard Blues (another hilarious turn), The Friends of Eddie Coyle (as a sinister Boston bartender who handled the hit on Robert Mitchum), Mel Brooks‘ Young Frankenstein (his legendary performance as a randy, tap-dancing, Wall Street Journal-reading monster with a huge schtufenhaufer) and lastly Martin Scorsese‘s Taxi Driver (in which Boyle played Wizard, the loutish, know-it-all cabbie).

He had a good career after this run, but the quality of roles and films for the last 30 years were touch and go. Boyle’s last solid performance in a first-rate feature film was in Marc Forster‘s Monster’s Ball, in which he played Billy Bob Thornton‘s racist father.

In the summer of ’70 or ’71 a guy I used to know ran into Boyle one night at an outdoor bar on the grounds of the Tanglewood Music Festival. After a couple of pleasantries he offered Boyle a freshly-poured brew and said, “Have a Budweiser, king of beers!” — one of the signature lines from Joe. I don’t remember if Boyle accepted it or not, but as he walked off he said to my friend (or so I was told), “Thanks, kid — you’re all right.”

Quentin on Joe and Boyle (and please excuse the two blurry pages….infuriating):

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I thought that Rep. Lauren Boebert, the Trump-embracing, pistol-packing Colorado reptile, was down for the count. Alas, she might squeak through.

From Vox’s Li Zhou, posted on 11.9:

2:45 pm: Boebert leads by a nose hair.

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Julia Butters, 13, is going to luck into something momentous. A feature, I hope. She’s got it. Unfortunately The Fabelmans doesn’t let her do all that much, but that’s not a tragedy. I’m just sensing that something exceptional will come her way within four or five years.

…their goose will almost certainly be cooked in ’24.

“This is an absolute disaster for the Republican Party.” pic.twitter.com/0M0WKJt4hC

— Republicans against Trumpism (@RpsAgainstTrump) November 9, 2022

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[Initially posted on 8.16.21, or 15 months ago]: It was late in the afternoon in the fall of ’78 when I ran into Chris Walken upon the New York-bound platform of the Westport train station.

Tall and slender and good-looking in a curious, off-center sort of way, Walken looked that day like he does in the below interview, which was taped in late ’80. He was 35 but could’ve been 29 or 31. Same hair, same calmness of manner, same “waiting for something to happen” watchfulness.

I’m pretty sure it was a Sunday. I’d been visiting my parents (Jim and Nancy) in Wilton. Walken had been in Westport to visit his manager, Bill Treusch.

Our encounter happened two or three months before The Deer Hunter opened. I hadn’t seen that pretentious, wildly over–praised Michael Cimino film at the time, and it was probably for the better. I was simultaneously taken aback (“Whoa, this movie is up to something!”) and at the same time irritated. Those ridiculous Russian roulette scenes, that interminable Russian wedding celebration and those absurd mountain peaks in rural Pennsylvania drove me insane. I was surprised and moved by the “God Bless America” finale.

At that precise moment in time I knew Walken from only two roles — that “who’s this guy?” performance in Paul Mazursky‘s Next Stop, Greenwich Village (’76) and his bit part as Diane Keaton‘s weird, soft-spoken brother, Dwayne, in Annie Hall (’78).

Anyway I stepped up to the platform, ticket in hand, and there he stood, reading a newspaper. I felt a certain natural kinship with Walken as I resembled him somewhat, and I wasn’t shy back then anyway so I introduced myself. Walken was cool and casual (“I’m Chris”), and we wound up talking all the way into Grand Central Station.

I visited Walken’s Upper West Side apartment twice in ’79, although he wasn’t there. I had an excellent thing going with a lady named Sandra, you see, who was working for Walken and his wife as a kind of au pair girl or house-sitter. I remember the oriental rug on the living room floor, you bet, and the wood-burning fireplace in front of it. I don’t know why Sandra and I didn’t last for more than four or five weeks but it wasn’t for lack of interest on my part. She was quirky and moody, but that was part of the allure.

I spoke to Walken one or two years later (’80 or ’81) when I went backstage at the Public Theatre after a performance of The Seagull. (He played Trigorin, and rather well at that.). He had no recollection of our train-ride discussion. Zip. I could have mentioned Sandra as an ice-breaker but I thought better of it.

The chicken-and-pears video was shot, I’m presuming, at Walken’s home in Wilton, Connecticut, which is where I lived for a few years and where I did my last two high school years. Paul Dano went to high school there also. And Keith Richards has a big home there.

I love, love, love, love the way Chris Walken pronounces “chicken” and “pears.” Certain people says certain words perfectly, and I mean better than anyone else in the world. Walken saying “pears” (“peahrs“) is like Peter O’Toole pronouncing “ecclesiastical.”

…on a four-lane blacktop I tend to stay to the right, largely because driving in the left lane (or the one closest to the yellow dividing line) makes me more vulnerable to the Dwaynes of the world who might want to suddenly veer across the line and smash head-on into an oncoming vehicle. If you’re in the right lane it’s much easier to avoid a potential Dwayne. I’m serious about this. I believe there are definitely some Dwaynes out there, thinking about suicide and self-destruction. Why not play it safe or at least safer?

A 64 year-old Louisiana woman who claims to have been sexually fiddle-faddled by Warren Beatty 49 years ago, when she was 14 and 15 and therefore a minor, has filed a lawsuit against the 85-year-old actor-director.

The alleged relationship between Beatty and the plaintiff, Kristina Charlotte Hirsch, happened, she claims, throughout most of 1973, when Beatty was 35 and 36. Hirsch claims to have met Beatty in January 1973, and was involved in some kind of sexual relationship with him until the end of that year. She claims she and Beatty first met on a movie set — presumably The Parallax View, a paranoid thriller that was shot in ’73 and released in June ’74. Beatty starred; Alan Pakula directed.

Yeah, I know — why wait 49 years to attempt a shakedown? Because of the protection afforded by #MeToo community, for one thing. There’s also the California Child Victims Act, which allows survivors of any age to pursue justice, no matter how old they are, when the abuse occurred, or if their abuser is alive or dead.

The CCV Act has to be acted upon within a three-year window, starting in 1.1.20 and ending on 1.1.23. Hirsch could have filed the Beatty lawsuit as early as 1.1.20, but didn’t then and didn’t for the rest of that year.. She also sat silent throughout 2021 and throughout the first three-quarters of 2022. Her lawsuit was filed last Monday by Jeff Anderson & Associates.

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[Steven Spielberg‘s latest film has already been heavily reviewed, discussed, spoiled and Twitter-poked. Nonetheless spoiler whiners are hereby warned.]

I caught Steven Spielberg‘s The Fabelmans (Universal, 11.11) last night, and like everyone else I was prepared to be mildly disappointed. Because the word on the street is that this 151-minute family film isn’t nearly as great as those suck-uppy Toronto critics said it was. A decent film in many respects, some have said, and highlighted by a few…make that three stand-out scenes, but calm down. So I was ready for a mixed-bag experience, and that’s exactly what I realized it was as I left the theatre around 9 pm.

It’s all right in some respects and very good in terms of those three scenes (Judd Hirsch soliloquy, Gabriel LaBelle‘s teenaged “Sammy” shooting WWII battle scenes in the Arizona desert with verve and ingenuity, Sammy meeting the cantankerous John Ford at the very end) but it’s no Oscar frontrunner, I can tell you that. At best it’s a soft frontrunner because there’s no big consensus film that appears ready to elbow The Fabelmans aside.

It’s basically an overlong, broadly-played family movie about a kid learning the basic filmmaking ropes while his parents edge toward divorce, and it really doesn’t feel natural — for my money it feels too “performed”. Especially in the matter of Michelle Williams‘ Mitzi Fabelman, Samy’s colorful, excitable, piano-playing mom.

Judd Hirsch’s big scene aside, the family saga is…I’m not saying it’s boring but I wouldn’t call it especially rousing either, and Spielberg doesn’t seem to realize this. And he definitely lets it go on too long.

You have to ask “what if The Fabelmans wasn’t a largely autobiographical tale about Spielberg’s childhood…what if it was just a story about some boomer kid who loved movies and wanted to make his own?”

The fact is that without the Spielberg factor, without us knowing that this is the kid who went on to make Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Jurassic Park and Schindler’s List…if this was just the story of a filmstruck kid, it wouldn’t have been made because it doesn’t have that much in the way of basic magnetism…it’s just the slow story of a marriage that slowly falls apart and about how the oldest son deals with it all.

The Fabelman saga (cowritten by Spielberg and Tony Kushner) is simply not that riveting, and yet it means so much to Spielberg that he doesn’t seem to realize it’s only intermittently engaging to Average Joes. If he had realized this, he would have made it shorter. It should have run two hours max, not two and a half.

I’m not calling it a wholly unsatisfying or a poorly made film, but it’s mostly a so-so experience.

The only parts that I really liked were those that focused on Spielberg shooting and showing stuff. The marital infidelity stuff (Williams cheating on Paul Dano with Seth Rogen‘s “Uncle Benny”) was frankly trying my patience. The anti-Semitic high-school bully scene in the hallway doesn’t really work. And in the 1952 section, Sammy’s parents can’t understand why Sammy crashed his toy train set? They’ve just recently taken him to see The Greatest Show on Earth and they can’t figure it out?

The only scene I really adored was Sammy meeting grumpy old John Ford (David Lynch). The moment when the Searchers music begins playing as Sammy is looking around at the posters on the wall…this is the greatest moment in the film. Ford endlessly lighting the cigar was too much but barking at Sammy about the horizon lines was great.

The fact is that during most of the film I was losing patience. I just didn’t care all that much. I kept asking myself “when is this film going to leave the ground and get airborne”? It finally does at the very end with Ford/Lynch,

Julia Butters, who plays Sammny’s younger sister, isn’t as good here as she was in Quentin Tarantino‘s Once Upon A Time in Hollywood because she’s obliged to perform in a Spielberg vehicle in a Spielbergy fashion.

And that weird Jesus-freak girlfriend Sammy falls in with in Northern California! She was like a farcical sitcom character, like somebody out of Happy Days.

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