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
I honestly didn’t think the top 3 spots would so tight.
I honestly didn’t think Nacho would open that big, or 3 Fast 3 Furious. Who says people aren’t going to the movies?
X-men 3 – to finish up with about the same numbers as War of the Worlds last summer. 2nd sci-fi sequel does as well as a Cruise/Spielberg blockbuster. That’s a good finish.
Cars looks like a semi-disappointment. Doesn’t look like it will make it to $200 mill, though it will probably do Ice Age 2 numbers.
Garfield 2 kinda bombed, but that doesn’t seem like much of a surprise.
Lake House was always going to be a double, and will probably have the legs to do $40-50 mill.
Now that we’re all friends again, let me say that your Nacho review is well pointed, DP. I wouldn’t disagree with a word of it (Although I may have added something about Jared Hess’s uncomfortable pillaging of all things Wes Anderson. Seriously, what I saw last night was borderline plagarism, right down to how the cutsy “novelty music” is incorporated into a scene). Oh so desperately quirky. Next.
The ironic thing is that, apparently, Garfield 2 has some wit.
I recall how shocked I was that G1 wasn’t agony… even with Breckin Meyer as The Kid.
And didn’t know we stopped being friends, Crow. But I haven’t read any of the blog comments from yesterday… and off to a screening now… hope everyone is being nice… I continue to get e-mail asking me to, for instance, “Shove (my) review up (my) ass.” Oh, those kids!
I could see a lot of parents taking their kids to see Nacho over Cars…a lot of family oriented people loved the harmless humour of Napoleon Dynamite, and I’m sure coupled with Jack’s track record in School of Rock, they’ll be inclined to see Jack yell, “Nacccccccccccccccchhhhhhhooooooooooooooooooo”
Even if Cars does take the weekend, it’s kind of a painful drop, is it not?
Incredibles, Nemo, and Monsters each went up by 50-70% on Saturday from Friday on their second weekend. If Cars is in that range then it looks to get to low $30s for the weekend, a drop of under 50%. That would be a pretty good hold especially with the $5-6 million a day weekday business. I also agree that Nacho could have pulled young boys from Cars. So while Cars is looking like $200 million or a little less it is still a bit early to completely writeoff north of $200 million. Still not a huge hit by Pixar standards and less thatn I expected.
I haven;t done the math but this is shaping as a pretty good total weekend vs. a year ago. That would make five straight up weekends and Superman and Pirates on deck and in the hole.
^^^Pretty good for box office. Has anyone seen any movies that they’ve actually liked, lately?
^^^Has anyone seen any movies that they’ve actually liked, lately?
Apparently discerning moviegoers is the one demographic that Hollywood isn’t interested in.
I’ll repeat what I said here last week (via cut-and-paste): “‘Garfield 2’ reeks of ‘Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas’ – a sequel nobody, including kids, wanted. I wouldn’t be surprised to see it open out of the top 5.”
I could run a studio.
How exactly is a $15 million opening for a low-key (and lower budgeted at $40 million) romantic drama a dissapointment? Sandra Bullock has never had huge openings (in fact, this will be one of her largest) and Reeves again proves he can pull them in regardless of genre.
With the occasional art house exception (The Gift, Thumbsucker, ironically some of his very best work), everything Reeves touches pulls in at least $9-$11 million over three days (Sweet November, Replacements, Hardball, The Watcher, Devil’s Advocate, etc).
People may mock him (unfairly in my opinion, as he’s an old-school actor in the vain of Ford and Costner who refuses to chew the scenery), but he does have a solid, consistant fanbase that always delivers to a certain level. Really, how many of our alleged new stars (Lohan, Walker, etc) could have gotten this one even to $10 million? And how many of our stars can be counted on to deliver at a certain level everytime even for a project that isn’t even that interesting. Considering there was no heat, no buzz, and moderate to mixed reviews, I think this is a terrific result.
You’ll pardon my steam, but it’s another example of the new world where everything is blockbuster or bust. Lake House was never going to open to $30 million and shouldn’t have to. There needs to be a place for mid-level movies with mid-level budgets to open to mid-level amounts. It did very well in relation to its genre, its reasonable budget, expectation of legs (we’ll see…), and its low buzz level in an insanely crowded weekend.
Oh, and agreement to whomever spoke about the utter lack of actual quality movies this summer. Really, June is half over and only Over The Hedge was really worthwhile (and it really was, it may be Dreamworks best cartoon ever). At the rate this summer is going, Snakes On A Plane may actually be the best film of the summer. How tragic would that be? Oh well, still hoping for Superman Returns, Pirates 2, and Miami Vice.
Scott Mendelson
I think you’ll find Lake House ending up closer to $13 million… The Notebook had legs but that was after a Friday heavy weekend… I don’t think you’ll find *that* many people loving The Notebook for it to replicate The Notebook’s long term success. Now if you compare the star power of Lake House to that of the Notebook (and the presumed price to make the movie), it could be considered a disappointment.
Scott – if we are talking “quality” then I don’t see either SUPERMAN or PIRATES being anything above “better than expected” but not great.
At this point, only three films hold much promise: MIAMI VICE (it is Michael Mann afterall, doing his first cops vs robbers thing since HEAT), A SCANNER DARKLY (Linklater, Phil Dick & that funky rotoscoping technique) and, as much as I hate to say it, THE LADY IN THE WATER (Shymalan doesn’t make uninteresting films, although I predict mass shootings if this one has yet another BS twist ending that you can see a mile off).
But overall I have to agree, it’s like the studio heads got together and decided to see if they could top last summer for overall boredom. It’s like the theory that says that Lucas made CLONES & SITH as disppointing as they were simply to get back at everyone who carped about PHANTOM MENACE (which now looks like EMPIRE in relation to the others).
Christ, it was bad enough when the studios stopped making great adult/Oscar-bait films. Now they can’t even pull off what they are supposed to be the best at: unsurpassed escapist fare. This is the second summer I will find my most satisfying entertainment hours spent catching up on TV shows on DVD.
The generation that’s supposed to be able to use cheap, off the shelf software and digital cameras to take over Hollywood needs to start storming the gates soon, because the ball-less wonders running things now are fucking up beyond belief.
“The generation that’s supposed to be able to use cheap, off the shelf software and digital cameras to take over Hollywood needs to start storming the gates soon, because the ball-less wonders running things now are fucking up beyond belief.”
the problem is that most of this generation of film students/aspring artists have been raised on crap and can’t tell the difference.
Yeah, Garfield bombs here, but I think the studio was aware of the potential oversees grosses. The first one grossed 2/3 of its worldwide total from oversees markets.
Nacho Libre isn’t the only film that pulled young boys from Cars. You’ll be surprised how many preteen boys love the Fast and the Furious movies.
Movies, schmovies. Italy 1 USA 1 final score. US had two sent off unfairly, were robbed of an obvious penalty and had what looked like a perfectly good goal disallowed. Robbed, i tell you, robbed! Oh, and to the poster above who thinks that Episode 1 is ‘like Empire’ compared to the others, not to stir up a topic i thought we were all over with by now, but over a year later i still think Sith is pretty great, the notorious Vader line notwithstanding. The space battle, the rumble in the lava, the Grevious showdown, Mace getting owned, the Order 66 scene, the theater scene – just my 2c.To think that just last year we had this, Batman Begins and War of the Worlds – we didn’t know when we were well off.
“…The space battle, the rumble in the lava, the Grevious showdown, Mace getting owned, the Order 66 scene, the theater scene …”
If only they had been in service to a film I actually cared about. And it’s exactly this kind of attitude of “Hey, just give’em a bunch of decent scenes and call it a movie” that has led to the sorry state of popcorn cinema today.
Here’s the telling truth between the lines of what Dr Wally said in defense of SITH – notice he does not put up there any scene dealing with Anakin and Padme. Here is a movie that turns on the supposed over powering love of these two characters, what will cause Anakin to betray the Jedi and embrace the Sith in order to become Vader – and we just don’t give a shit. In the end, Anakin becomes Vader because that’s what the plot demands to lead to A NEW HOPE. Neither his script or direction supplies the passion and heartbreak lacking between Portman and Christensen (both excellent actors as other films show)
But the type of overpowering and destructive love that some of us have experienced is beyond Lucas, so he fills the frame with eye-popping visuals and intricately plotted action sequences instead. I think it’s also telling that none of these films have produced the kind of memorable lines that depend upon well drawn characters to create.
Lucas keeps saying over and over that he made these films for kids, whereas the first time he made them for the kid in all of us.
It’s funny to me that he mentions BATMAN BEGINS and WAR/WORLDS, both films that have missteps in the final reels (the excellent BATMAN with the big action finale and WAR with the complete bullshit thing with his son not being dead).
It took TV 40 years to get back to level of excellence that was commonplace in the 50’s. Here’s hoping it doesn’t take that long for film.
^^^Even if it takes 40 years, it means we still have to wait another 5-15 years (that being 40 years from the 1970s, the last great filmmaking era.)
For me, eye-popping visuals and intricately plotted action sequences were still enough to make ROTS the best of the three prequels.
I watched “The Thin Man” tonight on Turner Classic Movies. It’s more than 70 years old, and you know what? It was more fun than anything I’ve seen at megaplexes for a long time. That’s scary.
The MFA-Houston is showing Jaws today, Joe. Wanna bet it’ll sell out faster than anything current at the megaplex?
I picked up Glengarry Glen Ross and Boiler Room.
It’s a shark-themed weekend.
there’s nothing to see lately so a Jack Black movie, no matter how dumb (and it was) is a better offering than what we’ve had. Most people were muttering on their way out “lame” and the movie wasn;t getting too many spontaneous laughs, so we’ll see what next weekend is like.
Yeah it does make me want to increase the Netflix intake.
I was kind of surprised they ddn’t move Fast and the Furious to take on The Break-Out.. .or even better.. Cars… releasing it this weekend just gives it even less of an opportunity to make money after opening weekend (though it’s obviously an opening day/weekend type of movie anyway)
Something else to consider: Today is Father’s Day. What flick (if any) do you think will benefit from this? I can see, say, teen-agers bringing Dad to see “Nacho Libre.” On the other hand, I can see younger kids wanting to see “Cars” (again, maybe) with their fathers.
I was kind of surprised they ddn’t move Fast and the Furious to take on The Break-Out..
Both movies are from the same studio. Also, the second movie is called “The Break-Up”.
or even better.. Cars…
GE would have fired the chairman of Universal for doing that.
FF3 should opened against… Cars? Menace the Empire of the prequels?
What madness is this!?
Count me in the group that agrees television is coming back, but not in the group saying that this is a bad year for movie quality. This is clearly a normal year for movie quality, that could just a little more bang in the blockbuster, and a little more given to the audience than what was advertised. Honestly, we saw the whole of Nacho Libre in the commercials for goodness sake. Time to surprise us a little more.
“Has anyone seen any movies that they’ve actually liked, lately?”
I liked The Proposition.
What is “the notorious Vader line?” I couldn’t bring myself to sit through the subsequent prequels after the trauma of the first one.
“Noooooooooooooooooooooo!”
>>>>>I watched “The Thin Man” tonight on Turner Classic Movies. It’s more than 70 years old, and you know what? It was more fun than anything I’ve seen at megaplexes for a long time. That’s scary.< Well thats why it is still being watched 70 years after its initial release. Myrna Loy made "Stamboul Quest" in the same year as "Thin Man" and other than nuts like me nobody is still watching that one.
Yeah, but people like me are still watching Myrna Loy in “Manhattan Melodrama,” which ALSO was released in 1934. Come to think of it, we’re also watching her in bunches of “Thin Man” sequels — and in “The Best Years of Our Lives” (1946), “Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House”(1948) and even “Cheaper By the Dozen” (1950).
“I picked up Glengarry Glen Ross and Boiler Room.
It’s a shark-themed weekend.”
No Swimming With Sharks? That even has SHARK in the title!