Clayton Davis to “Eternals” Rescue

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It’s not just that Chloe Zhao‘s Eternals has shitty aggregate ratings (49% Rotten Tomatoes, 53% Metacritic) as well as the lowest-ever score for a Marvel film; it’s also being trashed because presumably toxic males don’t like it when a woman directs an action film. I haven’t hate-watched it yet — does Davis have a point?

“Speer” Syndrome

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After serving a 20-year term in Spandau Prison for exploiting slave labor during World War II, the urbane and well-spoken Albert Speer — Nazi armaments minister from ’42 through’45, grand architect and Adolf Hitler confidante — published two well-written, self-serving books about his Nazi experience.

“Inside the Third Reich” (’69) was the most widely read and influential as far as Speer’s reputation was concerned. He presented himself as a basically decent and civilized family man who made a deal with the devil and was therefore “inescapably contaminated morally” for his complicity with the Nazi regime…forever stained and doomed to carry a searing sense of guilt for the rest of his life. “”

“Spandau: The Secret Diaries” (’75) was Speer’s follow-up.

Out of these two books Speer became known not as “the good Nazi,” as many have called him, but the “not quite as bad as the other Nazi fanatics” guy with at least some sense of moral self-awareness and regret…a man who hadn’t denied his guilt and had served his prison sentence, and was looking to somehow atone in the years he had left. Speer died at age 76 in 1981.

Speer Goes to Hollywood director Vanessa Lapa, producer Tomar Eliav — Thursday, 11.4, 1:40 pm.

Vanessa Lapa‘s Speer Goes to Hollywood (opening today) is a 97-minute argument that Speer wasn’t the urbane smoothie he portrayed himself as, and that he was aware of the extermination of the Jews, and that he was just as much of a Nazi shit as Himmler or Geobbels or Bormann or any of the others.

It is HE’s belief that Speer was definitely an ambitious, anti-Semitic, cold-hearted prick who engaged in a Faustian bargain for his own professional benefit. But it is also HE’s view that his saga is not anomalous, and that many seemingly or ostensibly civilized people have supported evil policies and homicidal regimes throughout history.

The Brazilian senate recently endorsed a report that accused president Jair Bolsonaro of the Covid-related murder of tens of thousands of Brazilians due to neglect, incompetence and anti-scientific denialism. How many tens of thousands of Americans needlessly died as a direct result of Donald Trump‘s similar response to Covid-19, and who would argue that Dr. Deborah Birx wasn’t at least partly complicit in these deaths? Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger knew that the Vietnam War was unwinnable, but they kept it going for three or four years after the Nixon administration took power in January ’69 and in so doing caused the needless deaths of tens of thousands of Vietnamese. 1.7 million people were murdered in the Cambodian killing fields — were the Khmer Rouge cadres who saw to these deaths born killers, or were they just loyalists who did what was expected? How many hundreds of thousands died in China’s Great Cultural Revolution? 17,000 were killed during the French terror of the 1790s. How many hundreds or thousands of present-day careers have been destroyed by woke terrorists?

Throughout history ambitious cutthroat types have done almost anything to get ahead or serve their superiors, and they’ve never given a damn how many innocent lives were sacrificed in the bargain.

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Unavoidable Beymer-Wood Vibe

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How much different can Steven Spielberg‘s West Side Story (20th Century Studios, 12.10) be from Robert Wise‘s Oscar-showered 1961 version?

Spielberg’s will presumably be woke-ier, for sure. (More critical of Riff and the Jets, more embracing of Bernardo and the Sharks as well as the general Puerto Rican perspective.) In the Wise version tenement back alleys and fire escapes were freshly painted in one or two scenes; Spielberg almost certainly won’t go there. Janusz Kamiński‘s partially desaturated cinematography will distinguish itself from Daniel Fapp‘s somewhat prettified capturings, and will doubtless seem snazzier and more sophisticated in terms of framing and cutting. And perhaps the performances in the new version (principally from Ansel Elgort, Rachel Zegler, Ariana DeBose, David Alvarez and Mike Faist) will feel stronger and more affecting that those from those from the old gang (Richard Beymer, Natalie Wood, Rita Moreno, George Chakiris, Russ Tamblyn).

But these aspects aside, Spielberg’s film can’t help but resemble its cinematic forebear in countless ways. The story is the story, the musical is the musical.

Long Time Coming

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The info’s a little vague, but after endless delays the commercial release of Oliver Stone‘s JFK Revisited, which premiered in Cannes last July, is finally happening. And, oddly enough**, only a few days from now — on Friday, 11.12 via the Showtime app, and on the Showtime network beginning on Monday, 11.22, the 58th anniversary of the JFK murder.

The longer version, JFK: Destiny Betrayed, will be commercially streamed (sale or rental) next February.

** Who waits to announce the availability of a new film only seven days in advance?

Never Pose With Alcohol

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It makes you look weak or woozy or somehow dependent upon the warm bath of booze in the blood. If someone picks up a camera, always put the glass down. That said, Newman and clan look awfully good here. Those moist Connecticut lawns and especially the fragrance following a rainfall. Judging by the gray in his hair, I’d say it was taken around the time of Fort Apache, The Bronx (’81) or The Verdict (‘82).

“Critters” Immortality

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I did a lot of good publicity work for New Line Cinema and Cannon Films (mostly press kits) during the mid to late ’80s. New Line-wise I’m especially proud of my nimble-witted promotions of A Nightmare on Elm Street 2 and Critters. During the Critters shoot I bonded with M. Emmet Walsh and Billy Greenbush (whose folksy manner reminded me of my Kentucky-born grandfather). For all my efforts I only managed a single mention during closing credits (i.e., Critters). Back then I had a problem with “Jeffrey” — I thought it sounded too frilly or delicate.

“Squid Game” Soirée

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Colleen Camp hosted a lavish Squid Game party this evening…Doheny Road, hills above Sunset. Director-writer Hwang Dong–hyuk, lead actress HoYeon Jung, Oscar-winning Minari grandma Yuh Jung-Youn, K-pop star Eric Nam, Phillip Noyce, Billy Zane, John Goldwyn, cast and crew…everyone, everything.

Son of “Tell This To Paul Newman”

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Posted on 7.16.17: Remember the Cool Hand Luke sand-shovelling scene on that hot country road? When Paul Newman inspires his chain-gang homies to cover the tar with sand as fast as they can, and they all get into it and shovel so quickly that the tar truck runs out and drives off, and the prisoners have nothing to do but relax for a couple of hours?

In the mid ’70s I worked as a tree-trimmer in Connecticut (ropes, saddles, chain saws, pole saws), and a couple of times I tried to apply the Cool Hand Luke approach to some jobs. The salesman (always an easy-going smoothie in a nice car) would point to a couple of trees and explain what we had to do, and then he’d say “I’ll be happy if not surprised if you can finish by the end of the day.” Then he’d take off, pledging to return by 3:30 or 4 pm.

As soon as he left we’d say to each other (me and the other climber and the clean-up crew), “Hey, let’s get this done fast so we can relax the rest of the day.” So we’d all double down and get the job done ahead of schedule, sometimes even shaving an hour by skipping lunch. We can do this!

The salesman would return at 3:30 pm and say, “Whoa…you’re done already? You guys are amazing!” And then he’d think it over and say, “Jesus, we’ve got another couple of hours. Let’s load up and head over to the next job!” Me: “Wait, whoa…the next job? You said if we finished this job here we’d be good for the day.” Salesman: “Yeah, but we can’t just sit around so c’mon, put the stuff on the truck and follow me.”

So after this happens a couple of times you learn. Never work fast, never exceed expectations, don’t drag ass but always pace yourself and work at an even keel.

I knew where Newman’s house was located in Westport back then, and I occasionally imagined that I’d run into him and tell him this story and he’d laugh and say, “Yeah, if only life was like the movies.”

No Offense, but “Spencer” Blows

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“Spencer (Neon, 11.5) won’t do if you’re looking for fresh insights into Diana, Princess of Wales, or even an absorbing rehash of one of the most rehashed stories ever. That’s not to minimize the achievement of Kristen Stewart, who portrays the former Diana Spencer as a woman possessed by outer demons as well as inner ones. The problem is the dramatic vacuum, or suffocating bell jar, in which her performance plays out.

“Pablo Larraín’s film, written by Steven Knight, calls itself a ‘fable from a true tragedy.’ It might also be called a fever dream, a surreal nightmare, a reductio ad tedium or just an inherently limiting concept that slowly but inexorably squeezes the life out of itself.” — from Joe Morgenstern’s 11.4 Wall Street Journal review.

“Spencer “is a simplistic, impressionistic head-trip film…a surreal mindscape movie…a kind of nightmarish Stepford Wives (or wife) in the country. Kristen Stewart will be Best Actress nominated, I’m presuming, [but she] plays the mad, close-to-cracking-up Diana to the unstable-adolescent-teenager, Julie Harris-in-The Haunting hilt — beset by visions & nightmares & the ghost of Anne Boleyn.

“Spencer follows the wokester narrative that British Anglo elitism is evil and rancid and needs to be resisted at all costs. Because Diana needs to breathe, love, live, talk to pheasants and save her sons from those toxic royal traditions and soul-smothering attitudes.” — from HE’s 9.4. Telluride review.