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
Maybe you actually have to be a New Yorker who was in NYC that day and saw the events firsthand to hate this movie as much as I did… but I’m forced to hold my review to opening day a/p Paramount embargoes. Compared to United 93, I felt it was pretty ineffective and the emotions mostly seemed overdramatized and false. United 93 left shaken up… this just left me shaking my head.
“Maria Bello is almost unrecognizable in blue contacts as Cage’s wife” – is blue contacts all it makes to be unrecognisable?
Lol, anyway.
Sounds good. This definitely does seem like more of a cathargic film that United 93. Sort of a way to tell a tale about this event, but not make it ABOUT it. If ya know what I mean? Whatever.
In my mid year Oscar predix I predicted WTC get noms for Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor and Actress (Pena and Gyllenhaal), VFX and SFX editing. I was going to put it in Original Score but I felt a) the movie probably wouldn’t use score heavily and b) They hate Craig Armstrong, I think. But then I thought Paul Greengrass would get a Best Director nod and not Stone. I know it’s probably unlikely, but that would be interesting, non?
Can I ask a serious question – how much of the film is just Nic and Michael in the rubble?
EDouglas, I doubt that many people had to be there that day to see overdramatization in this film, but it will clearly play differently to many people. For a good deal, they actually did feel as though they were there that day, and may look to this film as one door of closure.
My hangup right now is that it just feels like “We Were Soldiers”, a film that it was so cute and profound, all while stumbling on its face. Stone still gives me a sense of hope.
United 93 honestly did nothing for me. The positive reactions are actually still a mystery to myself.
Stone is one of the best filmmakers of his generation. I have no doubt that he will pull this off and based on what I have read here and elsewhere, he has.
I just hope that the actors (that means you Maggie G.) and he are smart when giving interviews and do not start going off on phrases like ‘we deserved it’ or some Loose Change tangent etc.
That would hurt what is most likely a very powerful film.
I look forward to it!
Yeah actors! Shut your mouth and fall in line! You might ‘hurt’ the film or something with your views!
“My hangup right now is that it just feels like “We Were Soldiers””
Holy crap… that’s *EXACTLY* the movie it reminded me of, too.
Then I can only assume you guys hated Apollo 13 too… unless the use of We Were Soldiers is a political one…
It certainly is an interesting discussion. And not unlike, I don’t think Superman Returns vs Pirates 2. Different people on different sides, but similarly a preference for dry or moist.
Oh God, I hope not.
Mr. Poland, does that mean this movie will finally get a place on your Oscar list?
No, I loved Apollo 13, but one of my friends did say that World Trade Center reminded him very much of a Ron Howard movie, and I agree… except that Ron Howard probably wouldn’t dare make a movie about 9/11. I’ll probably see WTC again before writing a review because I was informed by the producer when I saw it that it wasn’t final and that there were scenes missing, etc.
I enjoyed Apollo 13 for the tension and special effects. They both helped create what is likely Howard’s most engrossing film.
We Were Soldiers shares the family and mission aspects, true, but the subject matter honestly does make all the difference, let alone how the subject matter was handled.
It really is like comparing Titanic to Pearl Harbor. Sure, they both share the same skeleton, but the meat on the bones make the animal.
“That day, for Stone and for most people, was bigger than the politics. Like the day of Hiroshima or a year in a concentration camp or the slaughter of the American Indian, it might just demand a man who is as clear about the misplaced power used in places like Vietnam to open his heart fully to a tragedy that is so simply human.”
This might get me in trouble, but it’s overblown statements like these that really have me entirely sick of media rehashings of 9/11 whether it be movies or anniversary specials on the news. I’m not picking on you individually, Dave, but Americans at large when we constantly weep about a tragedy that killed 3,000 people five years ago (which in no way comes close to comparing to the Jewish and Armenian Holocausts or the fate of the American Indians). And yet we can barely be bothered to read a newspaper story about the mass killings in Darfur.
9/11 was supposed to be the event that made us understand the suffering that is happening in other parts of the world where tragedies like that occur on a regular basis. Instead we’re as ethnocentric as ever, inevitably maudlin and hyperbolic in our descriptions of 9/11 as if the world had never seen anything so horrifying when in fact the world sees events much worse fairly regularly.
So maybe I’m being a jerk in saying this, but I really could not care less about United 93 or World Trade Center.
is not four men fighting for life
Actually, in Apollo 13, it’s three, unless you mean metaphorically, in which case it should be many more than four. IMO.
I love Apollo 13, but I was not yet 2 years old when those events took place and have no memory of them. Nor did they have enormous consequences on our lives. I can’t imagine I’ll feel the same way about WTC as I do about Apollo 13, whether I like WTC or not.
No maybe about it, repeatfather… 😉
Intellectually, I understand your point, and I’m sure most Americans do as well. But there’s a visceral connection to 9/11 that none of us will have with Darfur or your other examples. Part of that has to do with the collective witnessing of the event (live, in NYC, or live, via CNN, etc.), whereas reading a newspaper article (no matter how well written) will not have the same emotional impact.
There is no question that there are important, tragic stories occuring daily around the globe. That doesn’t make 9/11 any less important a story, or one less worthy of a film.
I remember a quote from someone’s review back when Black Hawk Down came out, something like “the more powerful an empire gets, the more it feels like it’s the victimized party.”
I just hope this movie isn’t full of the self-pity that suffuses the trailer and was absent from U93.
Repeatfather,
Your comments are so utterly facile; so lacking in nuance and any perspective of history and how tragedies affect the people who endure them. So filled with arrogance and insensitivity…
…that they could only be said by someone with a ‘higher education’.
Ass.
Nicol, could you be a little more specific about what you thought was offensive and arrogant? Your own facile anti-intellectualism doesn’t do enough explaining for me.
Nicol, is he wrong when he says that Americans can’t even be bothered to read about mass killings in Darfur? Or do your average Americans read articles about Darfur all the time, and know and care about what is going on there?
Repeat – I am often enraged by comparisons of tragedies. That is why I always (well, almost always) write “jewish holocaust” instead of just “holocaust” because I think it is presumptuous for me or anyone to assume that there has only been one capital-H Holocaust.
That said, 9/11 is the only major attack by foreign nations on the America mainland in modern history. The movie actually has the death toll at WTC at 2700+, not even 3000.
My point is that events that have that impact do tend to be heightened. To the individuals, their experience is always the worst event. And my point is, Stone’s movie doesn’t compare itself to these other events or aggrandize the size of it. It is about individuals. And one person dead in your home is as powerful to you (not literally you) as Darfur or the jewish holocaust or Columbine.
Pile thousands of those stories on top of each other on one day and look at the vulnerability of the individual… which was the sudden vulnerability of the nation (however false our sense of invincibility was) and that adds to the intensity.
This is not a movie about 9/11. It’s a movie about a few people in the context of a bigger event. But it reminds us of how small and fraglie it ALL is.
At least, that is my feeling. Many will disagree.
It was really refreshing to read your post repeatfather. I agree with a lot of what you’re saying, and the type of angry responses you feared you might get only further prove your point imo.
P.S. You don’t have to go to Darfur to find Americans turning a blind eye to suffering.
We don’t have that anything near that kind of thing happening here, but we do have homeless and we do have hungry and we do have abused and we do have murders. Even in our selfish arrogance, I’d like to see us address those things too.
The world does not “see much worse regularly.” There has been much worse. And there are ar greater long-running tragedies. Still, you are right that there’s no excuse for us Americans being myopic.
Of course, the smart ass response to your first post, Repeat, is:
“9/11 was supposed to be the event that made us understand the suffering that is happening in other parts of the world where tragedies like that occur on a regular basis. Instead we’re as ethnocentric as ever.”
Well, if we weren’t still ethnoicentric as ever, the terrorists would have won!
I’m here all week… tip your waitresses…
I remember that 9/11 did awaken a big part of us to the wider world beyond, it connected people in ways that hadn’t happened before, and then things settled back down to normal, if not worse…maybe Stone’s film can bring back that sense of connection.
While I’m sorry for the families of the victims that 9/11 happened, I have to say that it has been overly dramatized, publicized, etc. When I went to college there, my international student counselor say she just collapse when the towers went down and ceased caring about life. Well…. it’s a sad event, but it’s nothing compare to the attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq. Is it worse because it happened to Americans? Does this mean that an American’s life is worth more than a Iraqi’s, in short, more than a life elsewhere? It’s been blown out of proportion.
That aside, I’m glad to hear that the movie is more about the policemen’s experience than the actually ‘attack on america’. Maybe I’ll actually like the movie after having such a bad first impression upon hearing that it’s been made. Nonetheless,when will someone Hollywood make a movie about an Iraqi’s family losing their house, family members, and their entire way of livng? That would make an interesting project.
I worked on a short film called “Winning the Peace” that aired on Showtime, directed by Eli Akira Kaufman. It was about an Iraqi-American marine in Iraq trying to reconcile his desire to “rescue” the Iraqis while also engaging in violence with them.
I don’t think anyone is saying 911 was more important than other tragedies. But I do think the importance of the attack goes beyond strictly counting the numbers of people who died or were injured.
So do those of you leaning that way find docs about US soldiers in Iraq irritating, as so many more Iraqis have lost their lives in this conflict?
More like frustrating. Here we have loads of men and women, most of whom are perfectly cynical and powerless like the rest of us, just going through the motions, with no control over their destiny. It hurts to see that position, but this is still the mission they accepted.
They know it better than any of us over here.
Speaking of rave reviews written by David Poland. This Sunday there will be a full page color ad in both the NY Times and LA Times for Miami Vice featuring one long pull quote from none other than our main man above.
The headline of the Ad is the “The Summer Movie People have been waiting for”. Nice.
I forget who it was who said: “One death is a tragedy, a million deaths are statistics.” But let’s face it: As a nation, as a citizenry, we care more about what happens to our tribe than what happens to any other tribe. That may sound cold, but that’s just the way it is. If you doubt that, look at your daily newspapers. On the same day, a hundred people may die in a bus accident in Brazil, while two people will die in shootout at some local school. Now you tell me: Which of these stories will make the front page?
The restricted Vice website is a winner as well. New content has been going up all day.
Well observed, Joe.
World Trade Center is about individuals… but it’s about the individuals who survived. The remembrance of those who didn’t almost seems like an afterthought. I’m not sure what was the purpose of introducing the rest of the Port Authority police officers when they were going to quickly be forgotten once it started focusing on the two survivors and their wives.
Perhaps WTC and U93 are going to be the Schindler’s List and Shoah of Sept. 11, respectively.
Forgive me if I vomit blood if anyone compares the most intimate, powerful and thorough documentary about the jewish holocaust with United 93.
Neither of these films come close.
But Schindler’s List and WTC… maybe… kinda…
For me, it was more like All The President’s Men… but I still think that Apollo 13 is the best comparison.
Hope those stains clean up.
My point had more to do with Shoah being a movie that very few people ever choose to see, the arthouse version, vs. the mass populism of Schindler’s List.
I would also suggest that you still massively misunderstand the point of U93, but that’s old news.
“But Schindler’s List and WTC… maybe… kinda…”
Wow, David… you’ve stretched before, but WTC is so poorly written and acted that it doesn’t even come close to Spielberg’s magnum opus. Unless of course, they saved some form of “bad” edit of the movie for the East Coast, but it’s a tedious, poorly made film beyond the recreation of the Ground Zero site…and Nicholas Cage is so poorly cast, too. And this is from someone who liked previous summer “Oscar fodder” like Cinderella Man, Seabiscuit (both movies that also screamed “give me an Oscar, dammit!” from every pore and fibre of their being.)
And where’s the announcement that they’re going to be donate part of the proceeds to the families of the Port Authority police who died on 9/1? … obviously the two that survived are getting a nice payday from their story. Their story is a good one… the way it’s told is way too Hollywood for its own good. Stone has made a true story completely unbelievable compared to Paul Greengrass, who used conjecture and improvisation to make us believe we were there.
I guess the disagreements have now begun in earnest.
Of course, I am not a believer that Schindler is a great film.
Sadly, only you and I have actually seen the movie, so you may have to readress the issue in August. 🙂
Of course.