Into Link Groove

general cinema
Dark Eye Socket a triple bill recommendation: frightening fiendish females
Inquirer Entertainment Shirley Maclaine is still quotable. Also babysits Bening-Beatty kids!
Socialite Life Kellan Lutz to play Poseidon in War of the Gods. This story is all over the blog rounds but the best part of the story is the one that's not making any headlines: Tarsem Singh (The Cell, The Fall) is in the director's chair. Therefore, we must assume instant must-see rather than trashy dumb action flick


Old Hollywood Great 70s quote from Patti Smith on French legend Jeanne Moreau
My New Plaid Pants wait, what? Helen Mirren was besties with Brad Davis? Helen Mirren is quite possibly the most fascinating actress with whom I don't have a particularly deep bond. I should learn to love her more
SUNFiltered Isabella Rossellini's uniquely awesome Green Porno series gets a new name and batch of creature carnality
Towleroad Have you heard about this awful situation in a Canadian bar regarding Jake Gyllenhaal and asshole homophobic blogger? Yuck
Life Archives 17 great photos of Steve McQueen, King of Cool [thx]
Queerty a parody of RuPaul's Drag Race

politics and films
i09 has a great piece on healthcare reform through the prism of sci-fi's dystopia stories
Michael Moore have you read this astute Open Letter to Republicans. Funny, sad, and smart in equal measure.

off screen fun
Pop Justice Finland choir does Lady Gaga's 'bad romance'... how long til America tries a version of this reality concept? Post Glee I totally see it happening.
Critical Condition starts a (seemingly massive) Madonna countdown project
I Need My Fix Kristin Chenoweth is delightful whether on Twitter or Ambien or both simultaneously
AIGA/NY an evening of really bad book covers. Sounds interesting
Litely Salted "Oh, Lindsay" I've placed LaLohan in the "offscreen" section because she is obviously no longer movie-related. Which is sad.

Box Office Blues (And Golden Browns)

I almost never cover box office here for these reasons:

• It's covered so extensively elsewhere you'd think it was the most important thing about movies. It's not.
• $$$ has zero correlation to quality. And sometimes even not that much correlation to perceived quality (Witness how many people flock to sequels of films they didn't love, expecting not much at all. I'm guilty here, too... I've dubbed it The Blockbuster Loop)
  
• Covering it only adds to the problem of 'the tipping factor', wherein something that is successful becomes even more successful (even if total crap) merely because people see the success and intuit that they're supposed to be into it (Twilight, anyone?).
  
• I find it nearly impossible to manipulate the masses to my way of thinking. Curses! They wear deflector shields to ward off my psychic will. If I ever find a chink in those shields, suddenly everyone will be buying tickets to films about women (yay), films with auteurial points of view (respect!) and films that get more thrills from acting, costumes, art direction and cinematography than from lazy CGI (yes) and, ummm, musicals (doo-wah).
  

But despite all this I do look at the box office tallies every other week or so and am genuinely curious about how TFE readers feel about the whole matter of box office / success / failure. I do feel it's important to check in once in awhile with ticket sales. So here we go. Let's discuss the weekend's top 20.

01 Where the Wild Things Are new $32.6
It wasn't just the cinematography that was golden. This opening take made JA feel groovy, got people talking crazy, and as the Big Picture notes, the latest from Spike Jonze didn't even have to lie about what sort of movie it was. Truth in advertising. What a concept! It cost $100ish million to make though so it's going to be a long road to actual profit. Still, wasn't it great to see actual puppets again as opposed to weightless CGI? That in and of itself was pretty thrilling. I loved those shots of Max burying his face in the brown ratty-looking puppet hair, so tactile and inviting -- like a stuffed animal you've dragged with you everywhere. You can't let go of it even after it's germ laden and smelly from your play time adventures.

02 Law Abiding Citizen new $21
Gerard Butler, King of Bad Movies

03 Paranormal Activity $19.6 for a total of $33
Previously covered by JA here. Even though I'm not into horror I'm curious because I loved The Blair Witch Project to which this is often compared.

04 Couples Retreat $17.2 for a total of $62.6
Or nearly double what (500) Days of Summer has made in its entire run. Honestly, American peoples... WHY?!?

05 The Stepfather new $11.5
Is any audience more faithful than the slasher audience on opening weekend? I'd guess no.

06 Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs $8 for a total of $108.2
It's holding very well which leads me to believe it has a real shot at the animated Oscar nomination. It's currently the #20 film of the year but still behind four other animated titles as 2009 money grabbing goes... including G Force. Weird, right?

07 Zombieland $7.6 for a total of $60
Did you know that this is the highest grossing zombie film of all time? That totally surprised me. Given the amount of zombie films we've seen this decade you would think there was some gargantuan blockbuster take in recent years that every studio was hoping to recreate.

08 Toy Story (double feature in 3D) $3 for a total of $28.5
It's all gravy. The first two Toy Story films had already earned $847 worldwide + the a few pennies from merchandise I suspect. I love the movies so why aren't I more exciting about #3? Oh, yes. Third Films = Quality Drop. It's a movie rule.

09 Surrogates $1.9 for a total of $36.3
10 The Invention of Lying $1.9 for a total of $15

"We're number two! We're number two!!!"

11 Whip It $1.5 for a total of $11.3
Actually Hurl Scouts, you're #11 in your third week because people hate fun movies that are not based on comic books, other movies or tv shows. The masses also (supposedly) don't like films about women unless they're romcoms with bankable A listers or films starring the Queen of the Universe Meryl Streep. Nothing wrong with romcoms (unless they're bad) and definitely nothing wrong with the Streep... but women make up more than 50% of the population so there has to be more to female driven cinema than that. I still can't quite figure the standoffishness that greeted this film. You can do -- and people do do -- much worse for an evening's entertainment when you hit the multiplex. Maybe Joe Reid is right. Maybe it should have been a television series instead?

12 Capitalism A Love Story $1.4 for a total of $11.6
Michael Moore continues to be the only documentarian who can guarantee a sizeable gross. His films make up 50% of the top grossing political docs ever. His box office pulls seems to be waning these days but still... Documentaries rarely gross in the 7 figures let alone the 8s.

13 The Informant $.9 for a total of $31.7
For some reason I was under the impression that this Soderbergh / Matt Damon comedy had flopped. $31 is respectable for smart laughs, I think. It surely helps that Soderbergh doesn't often overspend on his movies.

14 Fame $.9 for a total of $21.7
I assume this is not the kind of gross they were hoping for a franchise reboot. I enjoy musical performance films that aren't musicals as much as your average citizen (probably) but maybe reality competition shows have oversupplied for this very particular demand. Plus, there's GLEE which is JOY for free on your telly.

15 A Serious Man $.8 for a total of $1.8
Great per screen averages for this Coen Bros film (still in less than a 100 theaters) and Focus is obviously being careful with it. But aren't the Coens, who have been championed for many years by movie fanatics, at least kind of well known in the mainstream now after the consecutive relatively big grosses of Burn After Reading and No Country For Old Men and the ongoing obsessive fandom from their earlier work? It would have been interesting to see how well this could have done --even without movie stars -- if it had opened wider (if not wide).

16 Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All By Myself $.5 for a total of $51.3
Perry is such a consistent force. You have to give him that. It's probably easy to raise your production budget when you can safely expect a $40-$60 style gross for each outing.

17 Love Happens $.5 for a total of $22.4
Or... twice as much as Whip It has made. I bet you anything that Jennifer Aniston fans don't remember this movie in two years while Whip It will be in thrice as many DVD collections.

18 GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra $.4 for a total of $149.6
19 Good Hair $.3 for a total of $1.7

20 Bright Star $.3 for a total of $3.5
There will be those who claim that the new distributor Apparition should have waited to release this fine romantic drama closer to Oscar season but those people can never seem to grasp that not every movie can or should arrive in December with every other movie. There aren't enough theaters and there also aren't enough pages and blogs and television programs to give 75 Oscar contending films their due all in the same month. At least this way it got some attention. And a $3.5 take (so far) for a quiet period piece without any "names" is not a bad tally at all in this day and age. Well done Apparition. The question now is: can they keep it open for awhile longer to gird up for that Oscar campaign?

Thoughts?

Biggest Doc Ever?

Jose here with some box office news. Reuters is reporting that Michael Jackson's This Is It has broken advance ticket records all over the world.

The documentary/concert film spans the rehearsals of Jackson's eponymous "comeback" that would've taken place in London before the entertainer's sudden death.

In cities like Los Angeles and New York, fans waited outside in line for days before the tickets went on sale yesterday morning. In Tokyo, the film sold $1 million in advance tickets. With the undying passion of Jackson fans could this eventually become the highest grossing documentary of all time? This genre hasn't been particularly lucky in the money making department.

The highest grossing documentaries stand as follows:

1. Fahrenheit 9/11 (Michael Moore) $119,194,771
2. March of the Penguins $77,437,223
3. Earth $32,011,576
4. Sicko (Michael Moore) $24,540,079
5. An Inconvenient Truth $24,146,161
6. Bowling for Columbine (Michael Moore) $21,576,018
7. Madonna: Truth or Dare $15,012,935
8. Religulous $13,011,160
9. Winged Migration $11,689,053
10. Super Size Me $11,536,423

(numbers courtesy of Box Office Mojo)

Most of the films in the list deal with sociopolitical or nature subjects. The only film dealing with a celebrity (the Queen of Pop ironically) was released almost two decades ago, so it's not easy to predict how the box office will adjust to Jackson.

His death is the biggest news event in the world so far this year (several media outlets discussed how much was too much with more serious issues affecting the world) and Sony Pictures -- who bought the footage days after his death and rushed to deliver the movie -- are pushing it to become the worldwide movie event.

But honestly, how much is too much in this case? Where does a film studio cross the line between money-making thirst and appreciation for the audiences? (an album with the music that "inspired" the movie is already on its way out with original album masters of some of Michael's biggest hits arranged in the same sequence as they appear in the film...) They can argue that they were trying to make it up to all the fans who didn't get to see their idol live, but for others this might just seem a distasteful move to bank in on a tragedy.

And how will movie critics react to the film? As of today-at this hour at least-there are no official reviews for the film on the web and what will happen if when they come out they're not positive? Does the sensitivity of the subject matter affect how a movie is reviewed by professionals? This is one movie to keep our eyes on, as it's sure to give lots more to talk about. Have you already bought tickets?
*

4 More From TIFF: Chloe, Precious, Capitalism and Leaves of Grass

As promised, we're wrapping up the TIFF coverage with two more roundups from my friend txt critic. Here's four more capsules and late tonight, he'll be back with the ranking of everything he saw there, with eyes gleefully propped open for days on end.


On Precious

Deserving of the hype that’s been building since Sundance, Lee Daniels’ overwhelming emotional powerhouse was the one film I saw at the festival that earned a standing ovation (all the more notable when you take into consideration it was a public screening, not a gala). All you’ve been hearing is how “tough” and disturbing this movie is, and it is, but none of these descriptions quite prepare you for how humanistic and absorbing it is. The proceedings never turn into a film that needs to be “endured” or unbearable to watch. In other words, it’s rough going emotionally, but it’s not “good for you” cinema; it draws you in at every turn, and somewhat amazingly, there’s never an emotional moment that feels false, or a bridge too far. That said, there’s no chance of this turning into another Slumdog Millionaire populist sensation, as the material is just TOO dark and upsetting, and there’s no redemptive dance number to send people out of the theater smiling. I emerged from Precious drained, but oddly energized by what I’d just seen. I’d put money on nominations for Best Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Actress, Supporting Actress, Editing, Original Song. (A)

He'd put money on the nominations. Well, that won't have a great ROI right now, gambling wise since everyone is betting on this film in the Oscar race now. I wish it were opening tomorrow since I don't want the hype to overwhelm me more than the film.

On Leaves of Grass

Tim Blake Nelson’s first directorial effort since his unconscionably depressing Holocaust drama The Grey Zone is the sort of film that makes you marvel at the fact that it got made and scratch your head at what was going through the filmmaker’s head at the time he was writing it. It's daffy enough that you generally enjoy the ride. The story of two diametrically opposed twin brothers (one a redneck pot grower, one a philosophy professor at an Ivy League university), both played by Edward Norton, reunited against one of their wills, is largely a hit-or-miss affair. It's problems are the sort of thing that could easily be fixed if an eventual buyer forces Nelson back into the editing room. The dark comedy has some very funny moments, some carefully observed character touches, as well as comedy moments that go way too broad, occasional dead spots, and violence that’s way too piercing, jarring (and out-of-nowhere) for what’s surrounding it. What keeps it all worth watching throughout is Norton’s utterly transfixing and fun performance(s), among the actor’s best ever. (B-)

On Chloe

A genuinely good movie that devolves into merely a fun one in its last third, Atom Egoyan’s remake of the French film Nathalie about a woman (Julianne Moore) who suspects her husband (Liam Neeson) of cheating, then tempts him with a young prostitute (Amanda Seyfried), strives for actual resonance for about a good solid hour. It makes substantive points about faithfulness, and the complex emotions that long-term relationships breed, and Moore delivers terrific work. In the final half hour, though, Egoyan is content to let the movie turn into a soap opera-y guilty pleasure that revels in over-the-top revelations and pulpy plot twists. It’s still an entertaining guilty pleasure, and remains utterly compelling, but by the time it ends, you wonder what happened to that serious movie you started watched. (B)

I'm glad to hear positive things about Edward Norton and Julianne Moore movies since both have had rough patches but are two of our most talented players. This description of Chloe really make me want to see the movie. I tend to like shape-shifting movies... as long as they are purposefully shifting their shape.

On Capitalism: A Love Story

It never ceases to amaze me the slapdash, manipulative bullshit Michael Moore is able to get away with in the name of populism, and his latest film is the worst offender (as well as his first film I haven’t liked). Moore’s been getting a pass from the critics so far, and I can’t really understand why, as the crap he pulls here would earn endless amount of scorn were any other filmmaker’s name attached. Just to be clear, I’m a flaming liberal, and even I grew tired with the rotund documentarian’s perpetual going back to the well of blaming everything on the Republicans, and resorting to cheapshot Bush bashing that has little to no relevancy to the material.

Moore (seemingly) entered into this latest project without much of a thesis statement, and damned if you don’t walk away from the movie with much more than a shrug. He drifts from scene to scene without ever offering much in the way of coherency; he sits down with his friend actor Wallace Shawn to discuss the economy because... Shawn got a degree in economics years ago. Okay...? Why is this a scene in the movie? Moore resorts to his shameless, manipulative, exploitative tactics that don’t serve much of a purpose (a widower is filmed reading a letter to his dead wife, as the camera lingers on the face of the man’s crying child) but if it makes the audience cry, it must have resonance, right? And, frankly, endless scenes of Moore with a bullhorn in front of big buildings and/or trying to get into them are just boring by this point. Perhaps worst of all, after concluding the film with the message that capitalism is evil and must be destroyed, I realized the movie barely scratched the surface at explaining why (or what its title means). Because there are some jobs where people make money at the misfortune than others? I want to be on your side, Michael, but I need more. (D+)

Ouch. I hope I like this one more than this since I've felt for too long that we've worshipped the free market into places untenable.

Next up: four more capsules and txt critics rankings of all 26 pictures he took in at the Toronto International Film Festival. For now... are you intrigued by Chloe? Willing to give Michael Moore another shot?

Denis, Rivette, and Moore!: Venice Lineup Announced

Robert here, noticing that the Venice Film Festival announced the lineup for it's 66th installment on Thursday. Here's the in-competition list, with a few bits I managed to find about each film.

Baaria (Opening Film) dir. Giuseppe Tornatore
The director of Cinema Paradiso gives us a three-generation spanning epic about his Italian hometown.

Soul Kitchen dir. Fatih Akin (pictured)
Akin directed the terrific Head-On and The Edge of Heaven (if you haven't seen either or both, do now). He re teams with Birol Unel from Head-On for a comedy about culture and gender clash.

La Doppia Ora dir. Giuseppe Capotondi
It's been tough finding information on this as Venice's website (nor IMDb) has much at the moment. I can tell tell you is that it's a freshman effort, it's Italian, and it's fun to say... La Doppio Ora!

Yi ngoi (Accident) dir. Cheang Pou-Soi
A Hong Kong crime film about a policeman getting in too deep as he attempts to take down an Assassins gang.

Persecution dir. Patrice Chereau
The newest film from the director of Queen Margot and Intimacy is a tumultuous love story. No word on whether there will be explicit scenes but it stars Charlotte Gainsbourg so a man can dream can't he?

Lo Spazio Bianco (White Space) dir. Francesca Comencini
This Italian film deals with the tenuous empty time (ala white space) a mother spends between the premature birth of her baby and its removal from an incubator.

White Material dir. Claire Denis
While us Denis fans in the states are still anticipating her last movie 35 Rhums, she's moved onto her next. This one stars Isabelle Huppert and Isaak de Bankole and involves a French coffee grower in Africa during a time of great conflict. Those unfamiliar with Denis probably shouldn't expect any action sequences.

Mr. Nobody dir. Jaco van Dormael (pictured)
Here's a film about a 120 year old man who is the last mortal living in a world of immortals. I'm already sold. Jared Leto and Sarah Polley star.

A Single Man dir. Tom Ford
Ford's first film stars Colin Firth as a gay college professor dealing with the death of his lover. Julianne Moore also stars. I smell lots and lots of potential.

Lourdes dir. Jessica Hausner
Hasuner's films have been staples on the festival circuits (though still relatively unknown among wider audiences). Lourdes (which will also play Toronto) is about a wheelchair-bound woman who, wouldn't you know it, travels to Lourdes in the hope of a miracle.

Bad Lieutenant: Port Of New Orleans dir. Werner Herzog
Nicolas Cage stars as a wild flailing police lieutenant who totters on the edge of sanity... as directed by Werner Herzog. This will either be a horrible disaster or a fantastic disaster, or a total masterpiece. It'll certainly be something.

The Road dir. John Hillcoat
Remember back when Esquire called this the most important film of the year? We'll soon see.

Ahasin Wetei (Between Two Worlds) dir. Vimukhti Jayasundara
I look forward to finding out more about this film from award-winning short director Jayasundara. Meanwhile, here's a picture of him at some event with Miranda July. Cool.

El Mosafer (The Traveller) dir. Ahmed Maher
Word is, Maher's been trying to make this project his entire career. It's described as: "Set in three different time periods, “El Mosafer” traces the life of one man over three days in three different years: 1948 in Suez, 1973 in Alexandria and 2001 in Cairo."[src] I figured no paraphrasing of mine could do better.

Levanon (Lebanon) dir. Samuel Maoz
A semi-autobiographical picture about four soldiers at the start of the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

Capitalism: A Love Story dir. Michael Moore (pictured)
Unfortunately there's not much on the internet about either this film or director. Apparently he's a documentarian of some sort who people don't feel strongly about one way or the other. Seriously though if Moore's latest is like the rest of his films it stands to be controversial, sad, and true (mostly).

Zanan-e-bedun-e mardan (Women Without Men) dir. Shirin Neshat
Neshat is an acclaimed photographer whose been delving into film recently. Her latest is about a group of women who band together to form their own personal rural utopia.

Il Grande Sogno (The Big Dream) dir. Michele Placido
This film is set in 1968. I wish I could have found more than that. It's Italian and despite what Quentin Tarantino might have you believe, that country has been turning out some really good cinema lately.

36 Vues Du Pic Saint Loup dir. Jacques Rivette
Rivette's latest is a biopic about author Raymond Roussel. And considering it's Rivette behind the wheel, I'm guessing it's not your standard biopic.

Life During Wartime dir. Todd Solondz
Solondz's new movie has been described as a "dark comedy of sexual obsession" [src] and a companion piece to Happiness and Welcome to the Dollhouse. Solondz fans should be excited... hooray for sexual obsession!

Tetsuo The Bullet Man dir. Shinya Tsukamoto (pictured)
This is the third film in Tsukamoto's underground cyberpunk Tetsuo film series. I can't personally claim to have seen any of them but know that the first, Tetsuo The Iron Man is about a man who finds himself transforming into metal. I'm told it's weird... in a good way.

Lei wangzi (Prince of Tears) dir. Yonfan
Chinese director Yonfan gives us an exploration of friendship between four individuals in socially unresty 1960's Taiwan.

Hopefully that spread some interest around, and my apologies for the more sketchy summaries.

Politics As Usual

a political rant. skip if such things offend.

I didn't write much about Michael Moore's Sicko when it came out but now I'm wishing I had. He's got a new film on the way Capitalism: A Love Story and that's a great idea for a follow up. One might even call it a sequel, though I doubt it's intended to be (more on that in a minute). Here we are two years later and people are still denying the obvious... when systems are broken they need fixing. I'm not sure that Capitalism is broken exactly but it sure is sickly. It's been on an all sugar immediate satisfaction diet and now it has diabetes. Healthcare is broken. How much more fulfilling could people's lives be if their decisions about how they would contribute to society did not have to come down to "which mega corporation can I work for so my family can (possibly) get medical treatment if something terrible happens?"

That rabid right wing site Big Hollywood has a post up by a former SNL cast member I used to like (oops) Victoria Jackson. She always played dumb blondes. I had no idea she wasn't acting. In the post she claims that up is down and down is up and then goes on to prove that it is (only not in the way she thinks) by completely blaming our nation's financial woes on policies that have not even taken effect yet. I already knew that extreme right-wingers weren't exactly reality based thinkers -- I grew up in a very conservative home. I'm familiar with the thought processes -- but I was not aware that they had now invented time machines! What upsets me more than basic economic stupidity (I'm not exactly a math pro myself so I can be forgiving there) is the absurd and damaging attacks the Republican loonies are always making on universal health care. They want the system as is, the system that only benefits insurance companies and not people. Republicans like to scare Americans into thinking that socialized medicine kills people. I suppose they assume Americans are dumb enough to imagine that the streets of Canada, France and England are continually overflowing with dead bodies. The scare tactic question they love to ask is this "Do you want the government making decisions about your health?"

You know, that's actually a good question. But what they fail to ever acknowledge is that none of us, save the extremely wealthy, get to actually make these decisions for ourselves. The insurance companies make them. Didn't these people see Sicko? (Oh right, they didn't. They rejected it out of hand because Michael Moore -- their idea of an 'evildoer' -- made it). The insurance companies are only responsible to their shareholders and guess what? FACT: Our best interests when we need medical treatment are in direct opposition to the best interests of shareholders. The more money they pay out for our health, the less profit they have to split. I'll take my chances with the government, thank you. At least when they screw up, I can attempt to vote them out of office. And, theoretically speaking, the government's best interest (gross domestic product) is not in direct opposition to the health of the population.

I'd like to propose some legislation: From this day forward, crazy Republicans like Victoria Jackson should have to dig the graves (bare handed) of each person who dies because they couldn't get the medical services they needed.