April 25, 2024
Box Office
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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?
So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.
And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.
There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.
I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.
So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.
But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”
My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher
“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.
~ David Simon
Friends With Money is a great movie – it’s a shame they took it so wide so quickly. Now it’ll be gone within a couple weeks.
friends with money is a clueless piece of crap, what are you smoking?
too bad about Dreamz, looked like a decent flick but those are some poor opening #’s. Does this mean the American Idol audience isn’t interested in political sature?
Not a terrible opening, buy I figured with all the Jack Bauer love, The Sentinel would take the top spot. Oh well, looks like crap anyway. Clark Johnson remind anyone of Justin Lin?
Clark Johnson and Justin Lin are two different species of bad director. One is a career guy who worked his way up through the ranks, the other is a film student geek who had a flash in the pan. Johnson will probably have a long career in TV, Lin will probably never be seen again if Fast and the Furious 3 flops (but it’ll probably succeed enough to keep him around for another 5 years).
I think that’s two that didn’t screen from the top five. “Sentinel,” “Scary 4” and “Ice Age” all screened
Kellie Pickler says: What’s Klady?
Clark Johnson’s a perfectly serviceable director–both SWAT and The Sentinel were fine for what they were, and he’s done some fine TV directing as well as some nice acting.
The problem with Dreamz is that rather than aiming at a small target with a sighted rifle, Weitz is aiming at a barn’s side with buckshot. Effective pellets here and there, but no clear blows.
Clark Johnson is not a hack. Haven’t seen “The Sentinel” yet, but his work on “SWAT” was OK – and his work on “The Shield” borders on fantastic.
Um, so what’s the big deal with studios not screening? Only people who really want to see a movie (and probably wouldn’t care what a critic said anyway) go on opening night.
Film critics can get off their butts and go pay for a ticket (hmm… isn’t it journalistic ethics that says you shouldn’t accept free product of something you’re going to report about, anyway) Friday morning.
Hell, they can have reviews online (which is where most people get them from nowadays) same day (certainly thumbs up/down types anyway). Or in the paper by the next day.
Doesn’t seem to be such a bad development. Mainly it sounds like a bunch of people who had it really good complaining about not getting something served to them on a silver plate.
“I figured with all the Jack Bauer love” How many people watch 24, really? And then to wanna see a lesser version on the big screen?
Critics seeing movies they paid for is bad because they had to give up money so they will be even more negative towards it.
I personally don’t see the problem with not having movies screened because the ones that don’t get screened are usually awful anyway and while sometimes awful movies lead to funny reviews, I know I don’t sit down and read the reviews of every movie that’s out. I couldn’t care less about Benchwarmers and I doubt that many Rober Ebert readers do either, so why should the studio care?
On The Sentinal i meant to say lesser unaffiliated version. The 24 Movie will be different. That’s a brand.
I saw Silent Hill tonight and really enjoyed it. It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but sense is the bane of too many genre movies. It’s also a movie that really loathes religious fundamentalists, but its director is also French, so there’s that going on too.
It is directed by Christopher Gans so not making sense was a given (i liked Brotherhood of the Wolf though)
It’s funny.. I hated American Dreamz, too, and as I watched it, I couldn’t figure out who would like it, if I didn’t… American Idol fans wouldn’t want to see their show mocked… Mandy Moore fans probably wouldn’t have much interest in political humor (as obvious as this stuff was)… but I still thought it would bring people in cause of Grant and Quaid and at least make $5-6 million. Great assessment, David, about Universal cutting their losses. (Although to me, it looked like they were trying a similar release as About A Boy, Love Actually, Bridget Jones, etc)
I’ve seen a couple of times when not screening helped generate a bizarrely positive review, often along the lines of “well, it’s not GOOD, but it’s not bad enough that it shouldn’t have screened. Hell, it’s better than .”
That said, none of the non-screener movies of recent vintage needed reviews to push them along. I’m assuming we’ll have at least a few non-screeners over the next few weeks (Stick It, RV, and American Haunting all have “no screener” potential.)
Actually, “Stick It” and “RV” have both ALREADY screened, so knock those off your list
As a critic, if something doesn’t screen and it’s review-worthy, I pay for a ticket and get reimbursed, so it’s not as if I’m out the money on a bad movie, just the time. (I’m in a small-metro market, too, so I would presume it’s the same thing when, say, the New York Times posts a review of “Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector” on Friday afternoon or Saturday morning.) IMO, look at the movies that opened without screenings: none is a major blockbuster. Hits by comparison to budget, yes, but nothing along the lines of, say, a project like “M:I3” or “X3” or “The Da Vinci Code.” I can understand a critic wanting to comment on what will be American moviegoers’ popular choices, but I can’t honestly believe any critic in America sincerely wept over the inability to review either “When A Stranger Calls” or “Underworld: Evolution” by opening day.
The blockbuster that started all of this was The Day After Tomorrow, which was hidden for most, though it did screen the day before release for a bunch of people… but intentionally avoided the alt weeklies and many smaller markets. It was easily the lease screened movie of its size ever.
For that matter, Benchwarmers is the first Columbia film not to screen. The rest were Screen Gems, which is a genre arm.
RV is a family film so it’d definitely be screens. It’s basically films that are predominantly targeted at teenagers.
I remember Miramax made critics unhappy when they made sure to screen “Scream 3” at around Midnight on Thursday night.
Weird about “The Day After Tomorrow.” As I recall, there was a morning screening well in advance for print deadlines in St. Louis.
Actually, I thought it was “The Adventure of Pluto Nash” that started the non-screening policy. That was over a year before “Day After Tomorrow.”
And we can be eternally thankful.
“The Sentinel reminds us that Michael Douglas is still a star in this specific genre. The opening for the film will look a lot like the last three thriller openings for Douglas
Amen, sister. 24 has just been simply amazing this season. Whatever they’re feeding the writing staff, they should send a case of it to every feature-film writer in town.
ITA about Tv right now.
Every time I turn around someone is saying something like, “The Sopranos is the best show on tv,” or “The Wire is the best show on tv,” or “Lost is…” or “Battlestar Gallactica is…”
All I can say is, I’m not sure what’s the best, but it’s nice having a lot of quality and compelling storytelling to choose from (something I would have liked during the last two Oscar races).