A Metaphysical Can of Worms

"I don't see how I could go on living my life
the way I've lived it before"

[Great Moments In Screen Bitchery #17: Catherine Keener, Being John Malkovich]

Sundance Day 8: Parker Posey, Cyrus and Nowhere Boy

In which all celluloid begins to bleed together, sickness wins out, and Nathaniel loses his mind (from now on, shorter festival trips!). But, just when all hope for sanity is lost as Sundance winds down, Nathaniel dances with Parker Posey at a party! Nathaniel is elated. And no, I don't know why Nathaniel is speaking in the third person either.

Awesome Parker. As friendly as she is talented.
And fun to dance with, too. She was on the competition jury

Cyrus
The Duplass brothers (Mark and Jay), have been steadily rising stars in the indie scene with contributions to films like Humpday, Baghead and The Puffy Chair among many others. Their latest, which they wrote and directed, looks like a breakthrough... at least where mainstream attention is concerned. This is why people cast "name" actors. It wins attention and quite often name actors are names for a reason: talent. There's not a dud performance in the film. John C Reilly plays a sad sack divorcee, Catherine Keener is his ex-wife who worries about him, and Marisa Tomei is the angel he falls for. Because this is a movie, she falls right back. It's all quite funny and just off kilter enough to be surprising. All this despite being the umpteenth billion flick to reinforce that venerable straight male fantasy: yes, any type of guy no matter his appearance, serotonin levels, aspirations, past history or employment status, can and will win incredibly hot chicks. One wonders where homely girls are supposed to go for love?

A few notes on the performances: Catherine Keener is playing warm Catherine Keener [there's two primary modes: smart-bitchy and smart-warm. Both are wonderful... though the most exciting are the performances that veer off into complicating Keenerisms like in Capote and Please Give]; Marisa Tomei continues to be one of the most enduring and endearing actresses of her generation. She's wonderful here as a fun-loving woman who loves too fiercely and impulsively not be blinded by it; Jonah Hill plays her needy manipulative son (he's very funny) and John C Reilly her needy and only slightly manipulative boyfriend. The film is smart enough to see the parallel even if it finds that more amusing than worrisome. B/B+

Finally, I ask you this: Parker Posey was the queen of '90s indies and Catherine Keener the queen of '00s indies. When exactly is Keener going to be dethroned? It seems like she's still pretty comfy on that throne. Or am I forgetting someone...

Nowhere Boy
Director Sam Taylor Wood, who previously made the great short Love You More (see previous post) and her star Aaron Johnson (soon to be seen in Kick-Ass), pictured right, were much talked about at Sundance. Both of their stars are rising (this is her first feature but she's already a famous artist, this is his first high profile role with a probable blockbuster to follow) and they're also engaged and pregnant... not just with possibility. She's 42 and he's 19 which helps with the 'much talked about' bit.

Nowhere Boy, which has already been up for film prizes in Britain, will make it to the States in 2010 hopefully and it's well worth seeing. It's a biopic on John Lennon. The Young John Lennon as it were. Like Capote, it gains a lot of impact by tightly focusing on one specific time period and arc in its subject's life. Taylor Wood definitely has a gift with visuals and the film is always pleasing to look at. Johnson holds his own in the central role as the cocky but emotionally confused Lennon but the true stars of the picture are Kristin Scott Thomas as "Mimi" (interviewed here a year ago) and Anne-Marie Duff (James McAvoy's wife) as "Julia" who play estranged sisters -- Lennon's aunt and mother respectively -- and the most formative women in the musician's life. Pre Yoko that is. Both actresses are wonderful, refusing any standard biopic reduction into "mother figure" and becoming as compelling and three-dimensional as John Lennon himself, without the aid of the audience's pre-identification or projection. The Beatle's teenage anger at his mother figures gets a little wearying before the movie is over (grow up already!) and it ends rather abruptly but, all in all, it's a fine first film. I can't wait to see what Taylor Wood does next.


Cyrus: B/B+ (leaning B+)
Nowhere Boy: B/B+ (leaning B+)
Dancing with Parker Posey: A/A+ (leaning A+)

Which celebrity would you most like to dance with? Do tell in the comments.

Previously
Day 1: Travel Nightmare
Day 2: Late Arrival for Asian Day: Last Train Home, Vegetarian
Day 3: Marathon Day: Waiting for Superman, Splice, Bran Nue Dae, Boy, Please Give
Day 4: I Am Love, Buried
Day 5,6: Holy Rollers, The Runaways, Mother and Child, Catfish
Day 7: Gay Day: The Kids Are All Right and Contracorriente

next: a few more movies and my personal awards for the fest.

Sunday Day 3: Mad Genetic Scientists, Evil Unionized Teachers and Guilty Rich Folk

Five movies in one day is a common enough festival occurrence but I can't say I recommend it. It's fun to chat with fellow film fans when lining up for festival screenings but it can be highly embarrassing when someone asks you "Nathaniel, what did you see today?" and you can't remember. Speaking hypothetically [cough].

Yes, I did have to look up what I saw yesterday in order to share it with you now. Let's take them in ascending order of preference.

Waiting for Superman
This documentary about our nation's education crisis was riding a solid wave of buzz when I saw it. I can't share in the enthusiasm I kept hearing on buses and in lines. It's an easy familiar sit, using talking heads, animation interludes, and familiar TV history moments in the pursuit of its thesis. It's hard not to feel for the struggling adorable kids and parents that the film follows, though one has to wonder why the filmmakers chose to follow so many of them given how much statistical ground and educational ideologies the film also wants to cover (the sidebar issues are forgotten and revived haphazardly throughout). These kids are dreaming of college but statistics are against them. Most of them will end up in poorly performing middle schools and and "dropout factory" high schools. A lot of salient points were raised but this was one of those documentaries that left me wondering how much they'd left out in order to make their point, especially because the last act plays like a commercial for charter schools and constructs a clear movie villain out of teacher's union. C-

Splice
This horror/thriller was part of the 'Park City at Midnight' series. If you've ever been to a film festival you'll know that the midnight section is basically the punk rock bin. The films are meant to be raucous, offensive, strange or violent. They dream of "cult classic" status. Splice follows a romantic couple (played by Sarah Polley & Adrien Brody), who appear to be rock stars of the genetic engineering world. They even dress like they're about to perform for a club's worth of inebriated worshipful fans when they head in to the lab.

Sarah Polley makes a new friend. Literally.

The film kicks off with a smartly filmed "birth" sequence. The scientists create "Ginger and Fred" (hee), two lumpy slugs created from mixed and matched DNA. I won't bore you with the sci-fi gobbledy-gook science or spoil the icky surprises. Let is suffice to say that things don't go the way the scientists plan and their corporate sponsors ask them to redirect their efforts elsewhere. Our rock star engineers pretend to do just that. Meanwhile they continue playing god, making an animal human hybrid they name "Dren". Movies always punish scientists for playing god so you know where this is going. The best I can say for the feature is that Dren is spectacularly disturbing. Director/co-writer Vincenzo Natali manages to sustain a level of creepiness surrounding this... thing... that's pretty impressive. If anything Dren becomes more and more disturbing with familiarity, something you can't say for most movie monsters. Unfortunately, the other parts of the movie don't play as well: the acting seems stilted but insufficiently stylized, the humor often falls flat, and some important backstory details are only brought in as plot devices. But still... creepy. C+

Bran Nue Dae
This wacky Australian musical is about an aboriginal boy who doesn't want to stay in his religious boarding school. He'd rather be at home romancing his girl. This is not okay with Father Benedict (Congratulations hambone Geoffrey Rush. For once, you're not the most over-the-top thing in one of your films!) who chases after the runaway. Bran Nue Dae is contagiously enthusiastic but I wish it were better. It's sloppily assembled and its over the top antics begin to grate before it wraps up. But it is fun. I'm not denying that. It's particularly great counterprogramming at a film festival since film festivals aren't known for "silly". And 24 hours later I'm still humming the sardonic spirited closing number

There's nothing I would rather be than to be an aborigine.
And watch you take my precious land away..."

There's nothing like musical comedy so long as you're in the right mood for it. B-

Boy
Did you ever see the Oscar nominated short Two Cars, One Night? It simply watched children in parked cars, and the way they communicated as they waited for their parents to finish up with adult activities in a local bar. This feature from the same director Taika Cohen is inspired by that wonderfully suggestive short. You're still dealing with the way children react to the adult world that confuses them and the way they treat each other. Your protagonist this time goes by "Boy" (played by the wonderfully expressive James Rolleston, pictured right). He's obsessed with Michael Jackson and his own loser father, who he idolizes. When his father returns from a stint in prison, Boy's world is upended and he's forced to grow up a little, even though he's already essentially parenting his little brother and a swarm of cousins whose parents are never at home.

The film gets a good dose of laughs from its 80s era obsession (E.T., a number of hit American TV series, and the whole Thriller phenomenon) but Cohen also has a finely tuned visual comic sensibility as a director. He knows when to let a joke play out, when to cut away and when to let loose with imaginative childlike flourishes. He's not as successful at directing himself (he plays the often buffoonish father) and though the film sometimes struggles to find the right balance between comedy and pathos, it's a sweet well rendered coming of age story. Future sleeper hit status awaits. B

Catherine Keener is a giver. Oliver Platt not so much

Please Give
This comedy is quite a rebound for writer/director Nicole Holofcener. It's not that her last feature Friends With Money didn't have its charms but it amplified what can sometimes be schematic in her work: her titles are right on the nose with the characters as variations on its theme. On the other hand this obviousness has its charms. Why conceal your theme when it's so unusually specific and delivered with such a distinct voice? Please Give manages the neat trick of being sharply unsentimental and also loving and, better still, very funny.

Holofcener's chief muse Catherine Keener is front and center as a well off antiques dealer. She's constantly beset by guilt and assuages it with generosity. She and her husband (Oliver Platt) are waiting for their ancient next door neighbor Andra (a wonderfully tart Ann Gulbert) to die so that they can have her apartment but they throw her birthday parties to make nice. What makes Please Give such a generous movie is how fond it is of all of its characters and their hangups, too. Keener and Platt work well together as a couple who've lost the spark, their marriage flatlining into a friendship and business partnership. Even better are Rebecca Hall and Amanda Peet (pictured) who play dissimilar sisters reacting to the "vultures" waiting for their grandmother to kick the bucket and dealing with issues of their own. Highly recommended. Especially if you like talky neurotic comedies. B+

Signatures: Catherine Keener

Adam of Club Silencio here with another look at my favorite actresses and their distinguishing claims to fame.

"I think I want to end therapy. I don't know, I feel like it's time, y'know. I feel like I want to go at it alone for awhile. I mean here I am completely single and I'm not SO depressed about it. (Pause.) It's hard with Laura being so grotesquely in love... but I'm still okay. (Pause.) And its been forever since I've been obsessed with someone, so I think I'm doing a lot better in that area..."

-Amelia, Walking and Talking (1996)

If misery loves company, it has exchanged vows with Catherine Keener. She's made a career of trudging through the wreckage of characters' neuroses and judgment -- still somehow offsetting their scalding words with a cool, collective charm. A sharp acidic wit underlies even her most sentimental supporting parts. If strong, funny and flawed female roles are a rarity, it's simply because they're all currently occupied by Catherine Keener.


Menial day to day tasks like Walking and Talking become means for Catherine to brilliantly devour and dissect everyday perils -- such as the dating world; one small step for single woman kind, one giant leap for Nicole Holofcener's career. Obviously Catherine is Friends with Money to writer/director Holofcener, and their frequent collaborations have marked some of the most richly textured but stripped-bare arcs for women in modern comedy. In Catherine's care these characters flounder, they curse, they belittle, and yet somehow remain undeniably genuine. They never fully overcome their weaknesses, but it's their sardonic perception of themselves and their surroundings that ring so painfully (hysterically) true, and possibly lead them in the the right direction by the films' end. For as much as they struggle to find their path, wade through dismantling marriages (see also: Your Friends & Neighbors and Full Frontal) and begrudge the happiness of others, at least their mothers still think they're Lovely & Amazing. If Catherine's characters teach us anything it's that even if you're miserable inside, you still have to be able to sell yourself to others.

"Listen, Mister... This s**t is pretty!"

-Michelle, Lovely & Amazing (2001)

"I am dubious, but I don't welsh."

-Maxine, Being John Malkovich (1999)

Catherine's cinematic trials occasionally peak into darker territory -- even (quite literally) branding Ellen Page a "prostitute" -- but by and large she finds her trademark scathing charisma through her characters more everyday pains. Be it de-virginizing a forty-year-old man or an underage Jake Gyllenhaal (misery only in the legal repercussions), Catherine's career has spanned a wealth of women whose age and experience has molded them perfectly to dismantle any and all despairing matters of social construct. With biting, understated ease, Catherine Keener has shown that it's simpler just to say "f**k off," but doing so ignores the wonderful art in insult and disregard. And because a bit of dry, insensitive wit takes longer for others to process.

ShoWest: The Princess and the Frog, The Soloist, Meryl as Julia Child

Here's the final bits from frequent commenter Rosengje's ShoWest journey which he generously gifted to The Film Experience. Thank her in the comments for putting us in pocket and taking us along. Here they are...

The Soloist was met with a relatively indifferent reaction following a screening at Le Theater des Arts. I respected and even admired Joe Wright's (Atonement) latest effort, but had almost no direct connection to the material. Perhaps my greatest concern going into the screening was the potential for the film to go over the top in impressing the sentimentality of the story on the audience. Instead, the movie never reached the emotional heights that it should have. Robert Downey Jr. gives a typically charismatic performance as Steve Lopez, a columnist for the LA Times. Lopez accidentally encounters Jamie Foxx's Nathaniel Anthony Ayers Jr., a homeless former cellist, while on assignment in the Greater LA area. Ayers was once a promising musical talent at Julliard, but suffered a schizophrenic breakdown in his early 20s. Lopez becomes increasingly invested in restoring Ayers's potential, even as his own life is in disarray. Wright effectively grounds the story in the reality of the LA landscape, not shying away from photographing the city's least desirable areas. Unfortunately, this is also one of the film's most problematic areas. I was frequently uncomfortable with the portrayal of race and poverty throughout the film. The implication that it required the presence of Lopez, a relatively affluent white male, to shed light on the city's drug problems was troubling and lacking in nuance. The movie also falls prey to the Hollywood trend of providing excessive back story. We are treated to extensive flashbacks of Nathaniel's childhood and his eventual decline into paranoia. The sequences are competently acted and captured, but they seem redundant. It would have been more interesting for the audience to piece together the character's story on their own which also would have allowed Jamie Foxx a chance to provide more nuance in his performance.

Surprisingly (or not), I found Catherine Keener to be the highlight of the film. She has a small role as Lopez's former wife, but makes the most of her screen time. Keener is able to convey an array of emotions as she watches her ex devote himself to a stranger while neglecting the couple's own son. As an upper-level staffer at the Times, she also provides one of the more compelling portraits of a powerful woman in the workplace in recent memory.

Supporting Actress Oscar campaign possibilities for Keener than, or is the role too incidental to the meat of the thing? Speak up awards season addicts.

We saw extensive footage from Angels & Demons, The Ugly Truth, Julie & Julia, The Year One, District 9, and The Taking of Pelham 123. Despite my distaste for this Katherine Heigl person, The Ugly Truth looked unexpectedly funny.

Julie & Julia looked great, and the audience burst into applause at Meryl Streep's first appearance as Julia Child. I believe we were treated to the first footage of District 9, which is presented by Peter Jackson and is currently being worked on by Weta. I am skeptical of the story, which follows the segregation of an alien species from humans, but the film had an interesting look to it. Interestingly, Sony was the only studio to require a full cell phone check. Wolverine induced paranoia?

Paranoia what. who? I got stuck on the spontaneous applause for Streep's biopic transformation... from industry folks no less. I missed the rest of that paragraph. In case you missed it here's the previous post on Meryl as Julia.

Before a screening of The Proposal (surprisingly charming), Disney had a treat in store, a scene from the upcoming The Princess and the Frog. Disney is opening the movie in New York and LA on November 25 and platforming it out on December 11. The sequence we watched had elements that were still very early on in the animation process, but the audience was captivated. Anika Noni Rose voices Tiana, a native of New Orleans, who has dreamed of opening a restaurant for 14 years. Defeated, she walks onto a balcony to pin all of her hopes on making a wish on an evening star. Well, her wish is granted in the form of a prince trapped in the body of a frog. The prince convinces Tiana to kiss him and return him to his original grandeur, in exchange for him making her dreams finally come true. The clip was hilarious and poignant, and the voice work was very impressive. I thought the footage looked right at home alongside the Disney classics and I cannot wait to see the finished product.

I had no idea what the story elements for this New Orleans musical were going to be. Opening a restaurant, eh?

Rose definitely has a beautiful voice so I'm pleased that Disney entrusted their first black Princess to her. You get glimpses of the strengths of her pipes in From Justin to Kelly (I know!) and Dreamgirls but her best role to date was definitely her TONY winning jubilance in Broadway's shortlived but spectacularly moving Caroline or Change (all of this, previously discussed). Though it's only voice work and she isn't famous enough to get marketing built around her (like Cameron Diaz and Mike Myers for the Shrek films), I hope Anika the actress manages plenty of face time when the movie arrives for the holidays. This star can shine. Hollywood just needs to let her. But you know how they have trouble maintaining interest in the black actresses, even the very talented ones.
*

We Can't Wait #2 Where The Wild Things Are

Directed by Spike Jonze
Starring Newcomer Max Records as Max, Catherine Keener as Max's mom, and the voice talents of folks such as Forest Whitaker and Catherine O'Hara for the big furry whatchamacallits populating Max's imagination
Synopsis If you've never read Maurice Sendak's book, shame on you
Brought to You By A Sendak-chosen Jonze and the fine folks at The Jim Henson Company
Expected Release Date October 16th, 2009

JA: I was looking forward to this because a new Spike Jonze movie is always something to anticipate and this was one of my favorite books as a kid. But then I found out a bunch of wussy kids bawled at a screening, and suddenly I was REALLY looking forward to this. Like Coraline there's really nothing that toots my horn like entertainment aimed at children that's filled with nightmare-fodder. Some of my happiest memories are of my earliest encounters with monsters, and I love it when artists have the guts to recognize that kids do not always need the kiddie gloves. Sometimes a good healthy scare is just what the doctor ordered.

Nathaniel: And can we break right there to say how amazing is Coraline? I hope we're all in agreement. It's so beautiful / creepy / funny / weird and subtly trusting of its young (and old) audience. And if I can ever get out from under Oscar season I shall have to speak of it!

I have naturally even higher expectations for Where the Wild Things Are since the book is so embedded in my brain and since Jonze is a favorite filmmaker. Literary fantasies need visionaries like him or Henry Selick if they're to be adapted at all. If this is as strong as Coraline I'll be pleased but if it's better we'll have a new classic on our hands. A classic with fur, horns and tails. If it's that good perhaps it can wipe away those unpleasant memories of all the children's fantasies we've been seeing for years that think CGI and imagination are interchangeable nouns.

Whitney: I'm so curious to see how they make a 25 (or so) page picture book into a feature length film. Judging by the stills, this will be that perfect throwback to 80s childrens films that all of us 20-somethings have been waiting for, while still being entirely original. I'm excited to see what Jonze can do.

Fox: I love Spike Jonze, I love giant p(m)uppets, and I love that the child actors name in this movie is Max Records. The fact that it's also about childhood imagination and that Jonze has a great track record of visually interpreting the tracks of the mind (the way he did when Catherine Keener chased Cameron Diaz through John Malkovich's head) has had me "can't waiting" for what feels like three years now.

Nathaniel: Three years? It is the perfect candidate for "we can't wait". It's felt like decades of waiting. Come to me now new film. Come to me now. I once painted the characters from the book all huge like for a corporate event (long story and pre-Film Experience days). I kept them in my room for well over a year after the event because I loved them so much. Big fuzzy loveable monstrous things.


Did you grow up loving this book? If not, what's your favorite childhood book. I was obsessed with this one called The King With Six Friends but I rarely meet people who know that one.

In case you missed any entries they went like so...
*
We Can't Wait:
#1 Inglourious Basterds, #2 Where the Wild Things Are, #3 Fantastic Mr. Fox,
#4 Avatar, #5 Bright Star, #6 Shutter Island, #7 Scott Pilgrim vs. The World
#8 Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus, #9 Nailed, #10 Taking Woodstock,
#11 Watchmen, #12 The Hurt Locker, #13 The Road, #14 The Tree of Life
#15 Away We Go, #16 500 Days of Summer, #17 Drag Me To Hell,
#18 Whatever Works, #19 Broken Embraces, #20 Nine (the musical)
intro (orphans -didn't make group list)
*
*

We Can't Wait #9 Nailed

Directed by David O. Russell
Starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Jessica Biel, James Marsden, Catherine Keener, James Brolin.
Synopsis Jessica Biel gets a nail shot into her brain. Yay! Oh, okay, so after that she starts acting all crazily and ends up going to Congress for some reason and runs across helpful Congressman Gyllenhaal.
Brought to you by Whoever is crazy enough to partner up with David O. "Some F***ing C***" Russell (i.e. Red Wagon Entertainment)
Expected release date Given this movie's checkered history, who knows?

Joe: Nailed's tumultuous (that's putting it lightly -- production stopped at least 2-3 times as they ran out of money) road to completion almost made me forget what an intriguing prospect it is creatively. Yeah, yeah, Jessica Biel -- but look at all that other talent. Plus: Paul Reubens! Jon Stewart! Kirstie Alley! Even if it's bad, it could be a total glorious car wreck. I am way excited to find out.

JA: Way excited doesn't even BEGIN to cover my expectations. Yes, David O. Russell's is by all accounts a terrific (as in size, not nature) prick. So is very nearly every director whose films I enjoy. I don't want to be his assistant, I want to watch the wonderful insanity that springs forth from his corrupt brain.

If I were the sort who was into making lists - wait, what are we doing here? - I Heart Huckabees would probably make my top 10 for the decade so far, and I didn't even like it that much the first time I saw it. But then I saw it again. And again. And again, and the fucker swallowed me whole.

And that cast! Yes give or take a Biel - although I'm willing to give her the benefit of the doubt as of right now - it's like Russell took an ice cream scooper to my skull and splatted my deepest fantasies out onto a marble surface and rolled them up into human form like some sort of brain-to-human version of Cold Stone Creamery.

Whitney: I think putting a nail in someone's head sounds funny. There was a dude that actually happened to. A spike went through his head in a mine and it changed his personality. While he was once friendly and sweet, he suddenly turned into a totally asshole. I learned all about it Psych. 101.

Fox: The premise for this film sounds amazing in it's absurdity. Huckabees was that way, too... I guess everything of Russell's is that way if you think about it.

And come, come now... you guys are being a bit harsh on Biel. True, she hasn't shown anything significant yet, but neither has Gyllenhaal (dudes, come on... he's completely overrated). I mean, if Jake gets a pass simply because he's a cutie, then so should Jessica.

Nathaniel: I'm generally okay with mediocre actors being in auteur films if the auteurs in question have shown a knack for pulling interesting or best of career stuff from their cast. Auteurs are like painters in that way. Red is red is red unless it's on Chagall or Almodóvar's palettes, you feel me?

i heart david o. russell

And I trust Russell. I'd just wear earplugs and protective gear were I to visit his set. He has such an original comedic voice and he doesn't just rest there, always wedging dramatic tension somewhere inside the laughs. Spanking the Monkey was an attention grabber as debuts go, but he's gotten consistently stronger as a filmmaker. Consider Three Kings, the genius of Huckabees and the still undervalued Flirting With Disaster. This is a goldmine filmography, isn't it?

Your turn. Are you excited for this movie? And even if you aren't, whose head would you like to see nailed?

In case you missed any entries they went like so...
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We Can't Wait:
#1 Inglourious Basterds, #2 Where the Wild Things Are, #3 Fantastic Mr. Fox,
#4 Avatar, #5 Bright Star, #6 Shutter Island, #7 Scott Pilgrim vs. The World
#8 Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus, #9 Nailed, #10 Taking Woodstock,
#11 Watchmen, #12 The Hurt Locker, #13 The Road, #14 The Tree of Life
#15 Away We Go, #16 500 Days of Summer, #17 Drag Me To Hell,
#18 Whatever Works, #19 Broken Embraces, #20 Nine (the musical)
intro (orphans -didn't make group list)
*

Behold! Three of the Best Actresses in Hollywood

The picture may be old (Cannes, May 2008) but the sentiment is not.

We Can't Wait #1 Synecdoche New York

And so we come to the end of the 2008 "We Can't Wait" countdown. There's actually 2 more anticipatory posts to get you revved up about the new cinematic year but those are actor focused and they arrive next week (after we're done with the naked gold man). So let's wrap up this countdown with a group hug for MaryAnn of Flick Filosopher, Gabriel of Modern Fabulousity, Glenn of Stale Popcorn and Joe of Low Resolution who played in my little sandbox this week.

Our collective most awaited movie is... (drumroll)

Synecdoche, New York
Directed by Charlie Kauffman (directorial debut for the acclaimed screenwriter of Being John Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Adaptation)
Starring we'll get to that in a second
Brought to You By US Distributor TBA
Expected Release Date Unknown but it's in post-production

Nathaniel: Synecdoche New York is about a theater director (Philip Seymour Hoffman) who builds a life size replica of New York City inside a warehouse for a production. Say what? There's also this -- his trouble with women. Those women are ...Dianne Wiest, Hope Davis, Lynn Cohen, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Samantha Morton, Michelle Williams , Catherine Keener and Emily Watson. Whew. And if the cast isn't enticing enough they're all in service to what sounds like another original oddity from the mind of the auteur-like screenwriter Charlie Kauffman.

So many reasons to love it on paper already. What more is there to say? I hope you'll find something...

MaryAnn: This movie was partly shot in my neighborhood in the Bronx. Part of the whole Bronx renaissance thing I was talking about before. But that's not why I can't wait to see it. I can't wait because no one consistently blows my mind like Charlie Kaufman does. And I don't get my mind blown anywhere near often enough.

Glenn: I'm intrigued and confused by this movie. I don't tend to get all excited for trailers, but I am for this one purely so we can see what on Earth Kaufman is doing? "life size replica of New York City"... say what? It is Kaufman after all so I'm sure it's even far less literal than I imagine it to be. I still can't wrap my head around it, which, in turn, is what makes me anticipate this movie so much. Plus, when you throw in a cast like that - I hope Kaufman becomes the first director in too long to properly utilise Dianne Weist - you have all the ingredients for the #1 most anticipated movie of 2008 (albeit not mine, but the group as a collective).

Can I just say how overjoyed I am that we showed a bit of spunk and personlity in our list?! USA Today did their top 16 and it's just summer/Christmas tentpole flicks such as Indiana Jones, Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Narnia 2, Star Trek, The X-Files and The Mummy. I'm much more comfortable with my auteurs in action, epics in motion and all the other films we've discussed.

And thank you Nathaniel for doing the hard yards in organising this shindig. It's always great to discuss movies with people who are as equally passionate about them as I. Even if we disagree.

Joe: I agree with Glenn: we ARE awesome.

While I can't entirely ignore the nagging worry that an unbridled Kaufman could get in his own way (collaboration can be a good thing, and Spike Jonze can't be that busy on Where The Wild Things Are, can he? Okay, maybe he can.) That's a heck of a collection of women for ol' Phil Hoffman. Are we sure he's up for all that cardio?


I'm talking around the subject, because what else can we do? Glenn's right, until we see a trailer (and maybe not even then), we can't possibly presume to know what Charlie's up to. But if anyone in Hollywood has earned my complete and utter trust, it's Charlie Kaufman. Bring it on, however bizarre.

Gabriel: I'm obviously a sucker for PSH and Kaufmann (as anyone who sat next to me at Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind knows, right Nathaniel?), and of course being tangentially about the theater, Synecdoche New York plays directly into my wheelhouse.

But there's something rather splendid about the bevy of talented women here...in fact, I think it's their presence that makes me so excited in the first place. It's been so long since a great female-ensemble film has rocked my world...Evening was such a disappointment last year, and 2007 often seemed particularly oriented to the stories of men (No Country For Old Men, There Will Be Blood, The Assassination of Jesse James, etc.). With Synecdoche and The Women and Sex & The City, I'm hoping 2008 does female actresses proud.

Nathaniel: The massive female cast is giving me tingles in special places. But I can't say that I'm thrilled that it's Hoffman that all these amazing women are orbiting. Married to Marisa Tomei in Before the Devil... you'd think that would be the tops. But now he's romantically linked to Catherine Keener (ex-wife), Samantha Morton (lover) and Michelle Williams (wife) ...all in one film! He must have sold his soul to the devil.

But I'll take Kauffman and all these women in a heartbeat. I think Kauffman writes great female characters (think of Miranda Otto in Human Nature, Kate Winslet in Eternal Sunshine, Keener & Cameron Diaz in Being John Malkovich, and Meryl Streep in Adaptation to cite several examples. I'm so excited for this. And you?

~finis~

We can't wait. But we have to. In most cases we'll be waiting till the fall when Hollywood finally lets their meaty films out. Which film are you salivating for that we didn't mention? And what would've been your numero uno?

<-- Sister Aloysius prays for your wicked soul if you haven't been reading the "we can't wait" countdown #1 Synecdoche, New York / #2 Burn After Reading / #3 Australia / #4 Milk / #5 Blindness / # 6 Doubt / #7 The Curious Case of Benjamin Button / #8 Revolutionary Road / #9 The Dark Knight / #10 Sex & The City: The Movie / #11 The Lovely Bones / #12 Wall-E / #13 Stop-Loss / #14 The Women / #15 Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince / Introduction / Orphans
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