Nikki Haley’s statement about intending to vote for Donald Trump is shameful. I felt respect for her during the Republican primaries, but that's out the window now. She's can go straight to hell. Repeating: Chris Christie was the best of the Republican primary challengers — a blunt-spoken classic Republican who talked straight and plain about The Beast and the horrific, anti-democracy threat that Trump poses.
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Sean Baker‘s Anora certainly deserves the highest Cannes Screen Jury rating (3.3), but the aggregate critical scores for Ali Abassi‘s The Apprentice (1.7) and Paul Schrader‘s Oh, Canada (1.8) are deranged. Neither of these films has anything to apologize for, and they both pay off. Meanwhile the 12 participating critics are telling us, in effect, that David Cronenberg‘s underwhelming The Shrouds (2.2) and Francis Coppola‘s nutso Megalopolis (2.1) are better? Take the needle out of your arms.
Paolo Sorrentino makes eye-bath films. His lustrous visual swooning began to intensify, I feel, with 2013’s The Great Beauty, and was fully maintained in Youth, Loro and The Hand of God.
But there’s a limit to this kind of spell-weaving, and Sorrentino’s Parthenope, which I saw late last night, is exhibit #1.
Two actresses portray the title role, young Celeste Dalla Porta and the considerably older Stefania Sandrelli. But it’s mainly Della Porta’s show as the film is mostly about a series of guys (Italians of all ages plus Gary Oldman‘s John Cheever) staring longingly and hungrily at her.
I was feeling profoundly bored within 30 minutes, and had decided to bail by the one-hour mark if things didn’t improve. I wound up lasting 90 minutes.
If you’ve ever felt humbled or blown away by a woman’s beauty (we’ve all been there), the way to play it is to not stare at her like she’s a bright red apple and you haven’t eaten in three days. The way to play it is the young Warren Beatty way — one, express more interest in her personality and especially her mind than her looks, and two, behave as if you’re the beautiful one.
In the wake of David Fincher‘s Mank, why did Sorrentino want Oldman to play another soused writer whose literary prowess is quite formidable? After watching Mank I resolved to never again watch Oldman playing a chronic drunk, and now I’ve been through the same damn experience. In my mind there isn’t a dime’s worth of difference between Oldman’s Cheever and his Herman J. Mankiewicz.
While watching I was thinking of two older films that were about the same kind of thing (i.e., a series of guys worshipping a young irresistible woman and wanting desperately to “lay lady lay” her) — John Schlesinger‘s Darling (’65) and Bernardo Bertolucci‘s Stealing Beauty (’96). Both had underlying currents that were at least moderately interesting, Darling in particular. If there’s any kind of subtextual intrigue in Parthenope, I missed it.
It also struck me that Dalla Porta, who’s around 26, resembles the young Mia Sara (Legend, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off).
From Keith Olbermann's 5.22 Countdown: "Democratic and Republican pollsters are finding a shocking number of undecideds or Republicans who will not vote for Trump because of his talk of trying to make himself eligible for a third term, or eliminating term limits entirely, or elections entirely.
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This morning I finally saw Sean Baker’s Anora, which everyone seems to believe is destined to win the Palme d’Or. I’m onboard with this prediction, and it’ll be doubly satisfying (for me at least) if Baker’s film prevents Jacques Audiard’s audacious but flawed (as in totally unbelievable) trans musical Emilia Perez from snatching the big prize.
I’ve been searching high and low for a Cannes film that would take the strut out of Perez, and now…glory hallelujah!
On top of which Anora isn’t the least bit wokey — no militant trans or gay stuff, no #MeToo currents, no POC or progressive castings, no 2024 Academy mandate inclusions for their own sake and in fact blissfully free of that whole pain-in-the-ass checklist mindset.
Baker’s loud, coarse and emotionally forceful film, mostly set in southern Brooklyn (an area close to Coney Island and Little Odessa) with two side journeys to Las Vegas, is entirely about straight white trash, and yet a certain amount of soul, grace and dignity are allowed to emerge at the very end.
It’s basically a social-conflict, family-values story (written as well as directed by Baker) about money, sex, arrogance, rage, outsider sturm und drang and a truly bountiful blend of incredible bullshit, screaming hostility and straight talk.
The first act is exasperating (mostly vulgar behavior by profligate 20something party animals) but once a certain family gets involved…look out.
The Anora battle is between the cynical, sex-working, Russian-descended titular character (Mikey Madison, who played the hysterical, screechy-voiced Susan Atkins in OnceUponaTimeinHollywood) who prefers the colloquial “Ani” vs. a demimonde of vulgar, grotesquely wealthy Russians, principally Mark Eydelshteyn’s Ivan, the wasteful-idiot son of a Russian oligarch, and one or two none-too-bright Armenians.
And yet it ends on a note of honest emotional admission and revelation even. There’s actually a decent dude in this film, played by YuriyBorisov…a Russian fellow who isn’t a ferociously propulsive wolverine…imagine.
Madison is a revelation — she deserves to win the Best Actress prize. Out of the blue, her career has been high-octaned and then some.
Neon is distributing Anora — easily the strongest film they’ve ever gotten their mitts on.
Friendoon “okay” Emilia Perez: “It feels like AI Almodóvar. It checks 17 boxes, but it’s not moving — you don’t swoon. It’s actually rather conservative when it comes to the trans thing. Ten years from now, it’ll play like a trans minstrel show.”
David Cronenberg‘s The Shrouds is a brainy, silky, sophisticated, deliberately paced, high-toned “horror” film for smart, well-educated people. I loved hanging with it…hanging in it.
Vincent Cassel, in great physical shape and adorned with a great silver be-bop pompadour haircut, is Karsh, a widower who’s devastated by the passing of his wife Becca (Diane Kruger). As a way of managing his grief he’s invented GraveTech, a cutting-edge technology that enables survivors to keep visual tabs on their loved ones as they rot in their tombs. I’m serious — that’s really what it’s about. Watching a loved one’s body slowly rot and decay. I was sitting there going “uhm…okay” and then it was “wait…really?”
I didn’t love the complex, slow-moving story but I adored the Cronenberg-ness…the handsome stylings, the discreet nudity, the sex, the flush vibe, the upscale Canadian atmosphere, the shadowy mood, the smart dialogue. Cassel, Kruger, Guy Pearce, Sandrine Holt, Elizabeth Saunders…everyone brings their A-level game. That was enough for me.
“Uhm, I just wanted to ask, particularly Gabe and Ali, about the amazing, forme, emotionalmoment when, having known about Roy Cohn a good part, part of my life…and believing and understanding that he was oneofthemostreprehensiblehumanbeingsofthe20thCentury, arguably…I just thought the movie does an amazingthing by actuallymakingyoufeelsorryforhim…empathy…when Trump basically screws him over, and I was just wondering if you had sort of tried to build to that emotional moment…whether that was a key strategy on your part.”
Who reunites with an old girlfriend, falls in love again, gets married, parades around and then two years into the renewed relationship decides that it was all an ill-considered impulse thing? Whoops!
We’ve all made the occasional mistake or acted intemperately with romantic partners, but who decides to get married twice (Las Vegas, Savannah) on a half-assed romantic whim…a whim that doesn’t hold up after a year or two? Who does this?
The cliche about love with a certain person being better “the second time around” is apparently untethered to the reality of human experience.
AMC's decision to post a trigger warning about Goodfellas was reported last weekend. We all know that the people who push for trigger warnings ("uh-oh, you might be upset or traumatized by something in this film, especially if you're an ultra-sensitive Zoomer #MeToo-er!") are unstable fanatics and Stalinists at heart -- a blight upon our culture.
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Nikki Haley’s statement about intending to vote for Donald Trump is shameful. I felt respect for her during the Republican primaries, but that's out the window now. She's can go straight to hell. Repeating: Chris Christie was the best of the Republican primary challengers — a blunt-spoken classic Republican who talked straight and plain about The Beast and the horrific, anti-democracy threat that Trump poses.
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