BYOB – October 18
Should have put this up last night… sorry.
Long day of travel… now in Indianapolis for the Heartland Film Festival.
What’s been going on while I have been stuck in the long tubes of stale air all day?
ADDED: Oh yes… let me say… the #1 reason why Michael Clayton is being seen as a negative opening by anyone this week? Because idiots who know nothing about the box office are trying to sell a story that doesn’t exist.
The danger of box office reporting is not that it detracts from the art. It’s that anyone who can go on Box Office Mojo assumes they “get it.” They do not.
BTW… Michael Clayton moved from fourth place for the weekend (2-4 were all within $700k of one another) to third on Monday and Tuesday and second yesterday. So please… just shut up and let a movie emerge. Do I really need to point out that the only Best Picture nominee last year to have a single weeked as strong as Clayton’s opening -ever- was The Departed. A gread total of ZERO of the BP noms from the year before ever had a weekend as good.
So what’s the bad part? If the movie grosses $50 million domestic, $75 million overseas, and scores 7 or more Oscar noms… is that a bad thing now? Is this all idiot blowback from Good Night, and Good Luck. Or is George Clooney and this movie just this week’s victim of “legitimate” Hollywood journalists turning into hype-driven non-thinkers who thrive on the harshest headline.
There is a real discussion to be had about what George Clooney’s level of stardom is. As I pointed out earlier this week in another discussion, I rank him in the #30s of star power at the box office. But at the very least, people who want to start going negative for no real reason should be forced to start with an offering of what number and what achievement the movie needs for them to apologize… like they would ever be that honest!
First off, tonights episode of THE OFFICE was absolutely perfect. Hillarious and touching…all in one! We must see more of Moses Schrute!!
In terms of your comments DP….I think the reason MICHAEL CLAYTON is coming off as a “negative opening” is because EVERYONE puts so much frigging stock in opening weekend that if something doesn’t open big, people don’t go see it. I honestly believe people out there say “well, it wasn’t even in the top 3 this weekend so it must not be good.”
I’m not talking about folks like us who pay attention, I’m talking about the masses. Box office numbers have become the new movie critics. If it made money, it must be good…or appeal to kids, who like everything targeted at kids for at least opening weekend.
The right-wing has it in for Clooney, as I’ve seen the ‘Can he open movies anymore?’ headlines around Instapundit and the like.
Meant to see the film last weekend, will see it tomorrow.
Caught Wings tonight at the Egyptian, I think it’s the first time the print has screened since they went through a couple years trouble to make it for the 75th anniversary academy screening series from a few years back. I’ve seen Sunrise on film a few times and I was stunned to find that Wings measures up, especially in the photography department–but like the Big Parade, I don’t think this would hold up nearly as well on homevideo the way an intimate drama like Sunrise does. It’s kind of a shame that Wings has been so overshadowed by both Sunrise and All Quiet on the Western Front, because I think the film is pretty much the equal of both those films.
Hey, is it some sort of rule that every 3am Skinemax movie now has to star the same fucking cast? Evan Stone, Beverly Lynne, Christine Nguyen, Nicole Sheridan, Alexandre Boisvert seem to be in constant, endless, joyless rotation at all hours of the night, every night.
Genie Bikini Bikini Genie Pirates Round-Up Bikini.
Yeah, okay, go ahead and PRETEND you don’t know what I’m talking about. What happened to the glory days when Skinemax meant awesome ’70s’d-out softcore, not the same six hack actors in the same movie every time, all of which sadly seem to be DIRECTED BY FRED OLEN RAY.
On-topic, the right VERY MUCH seems to have it out for Clooney at the moment. No idea why. Not like he’s some maniac anarchist or anything.
Hey, since it’s BYOB, it’s 3am, and I’m drunk, here’s a tale to delight and depress you in equal measure.
It’s the story of a guy– Let’s call him, oh, LexZ.
Lex grew up on the East Coast, but wasn’t fortunate enough to have a showbiz family, a trust fund, or a Hollywood in, but he did love movies. Wrote reviews for his high school and college papers, went to school for a Film degree, took theater classes, did extra work, wrote spec scripts, and moved to the City of Angels in a hallowed little year called 1996.
Upon arriving, he hit the ground writing, firing query letters to agents re: his writing, doing extra work, studying acting, doing open-mike standup at all the local clubs.
But due to a squeamishness about the idea of a “roommate” and a laughable personal pride that could never fully embrace the “starving artist” lifestyle, Lex took a white-collar day job and a Valley one-bedroom. Soon enough the acting classes gave way to a 9-5 corporate lifestyle at inflexible jobs and a compulsion to clear hundreds a week the old-school way, to better afford one’s own personal residence.
11 years later, and this same guy is a shell of his former self; He hasn’t been on a standup stage in two full years. Hasn’t written a lick in nine years. Has never even AUDITIONED FOR A ROLE in Los Angeles, has no SAG card, and spends every waking hour of his life despising himself to the core, a failure, a loser, a profane, stunted, fat, beer-chugging fuck-up too stubborn or clueless to chuck it all and really go for it, instead opting for domestic boredom and security. 11 fucking years on the far, far, FAR postproduction fringes, and no showbiz connections. The idea of actually being in the WGA or so much as interviewing for a talent manager is as supernatural, alien, and unlikely as his chances of flying like Superman.
Despite a bit of a way with words, and the fact that he still sees 110 movies a year on his own dime, even a film critic spot seems like the most unlikely of goals, less’n it’s some unpaid DVD Web site.
So when we all talk about this biz and take things for granted and rant about royalties and A-listers and grosses and shit, it’s important to keep in perspective that for some people, even so much as a SAG card is roughly on par with a quarterback position for the Colts in terms of probability.
Fuck everything.
Start a blog!
Can’t be too hard to get into the WGA. I’m in it.
Not that being in the WGA or SAG would necessarily change your life at all. Like I said, I’m in the WGA, but I still haven’t been able to land an agent that’s worth a damn. I can’t get into the room to pitch myself for assignments and it still takes a bit of doing to get my specs read by anyone who matters. If my wife didn’t earn a decent living, I wouldn’t be able to concentrate on writing/filmmaking. I’d have to have a job to make ends meet. All this fighting about residuals is meaningless to me because I’ve not earned a single penny in residuals yet. It’s purely theoretical to me.
By the same token, a very good friend of mine has had his SAG card for several years. He’s had a ton of background roles in major movies, on television and whatnot, but he also doesn’t have a quality agent and doesn’t make anywhere near enough money as an actor to make a living.
I’m not writing this to be a sob story or to have anybody feel sorry for us or anything because I do feel fortunate that I’ve been able to accomplish the little that I have accomplished. But it’s not all sunshine and daisies on this side of the fence, either. And even many of us who have gotten those Union cards can’t really relate to the Guild-related arguments that come up.
Wow, don’t even get me started on this box office shit.. in the last two days, two “respectable” traditional media sites have stated without any sign of irony that a 50% drop for any movie is “normal” and/or “acceptable” (these would be THR and the LA Times) and I was curious what universe they were living in because a 50% drop for any movie is bad and it’s only normal for horror movies or teen-driven comedies (like “The Comebacks”–however it does this weekend, it’s going to TANK next weekend).
I don’t like to toot my own horn, but I’ve done the box office thing for six years now and it burns my bridges whenever there’s a newbie entering “the game” and thinking they know best but when places like THR and LA Times start spouting complete bullshit and acting like they have any idea what is going on, it makes me want to bring back my “Battle Cry” and call them out on not knowing what they’re talking about.
And any person who merely uses tracking to predict the weekend box office without any further research to back it up, obviously doesn’t have a clue what they’re doing. (At the start of his article this week, John Horn at LA Times was claiming that the point of tracking was to predict box office… no, the point of tracking is to let the studios know if their marketing is working or they need to step things up.)
On the BO for M Clayton. It was one of the most competitve weeks for adult themed films. I think they cannibalized each other a bit. There is just so much product out there. I think Dave is right. We have to look at this movie’s grosses this week and the next to see if it has any kind of traction.
Additionally, becaues thses very BO pundits got it all wrong with Tyler Perry emerging as the ‘suprise’ #1 movie, even though he’s no stranger to 20M openings. The pundits got it wrong. Their pick for number 1 didn’t make it, and thus it ‘must’ be a failure and a disappointment. Gimme a break will ya.
On another note..any comments on Francis Ford Coppola’s statements on DeNiro,Pacina and Nicholson. Showbizdata reported his accusing Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, and Jack Nicholson of “living off the fat of the land” and doing little that is challenging or ambitious. “Pacino is very rich, maybe because he never spends any money. … [De Niro] created an empire and is wealthy and powerful. … [Nicholson] is always wired in with the big guys and the big bosses of the studios.” Coppola added, “You know, even in those days after The Godfather, I didn’t feel that those actors were ready to say, ‘Let’s do something else really ambitious.” Commenting on Coppola’s remarks, the New York Daily News’s “Rush and Molloy” column observed, “Some might ask Coppola how he has challenged himself lately. He admits he has been focused on his vineyard and on his resorts in Belize and Guatemala.” And L.A. Weekly columnist Nikki Finke remarked, “Is there anything more hypocritical than a judgmental Francis Ford Coppola?”
Sorry to post a Nikki Finke quote DP, just thought you’d like to opine on this as well.
A few hours ago, I saw a midnight showing of The Comebacks. I was only one of four people in the theater. To put this in perspective — a few months ago, I was one of two dozen people in the same theater for a midnight showing of D.O.A. This may mean nothing, this may be an aberration — and, to be fair, D.O.A. was a summer release. Still…
The Coppola pull is from GQ and I’ve been waiting to read the whole thing to comment. I know… old fashioned, this notion of reading an entire interview before commenting on a gossip pull-quote.
That said…
Francis has had a career as Kane, without the money. Zoetrope was audacious and real. He got caught up in the Peter Pan thing for YEARS and even after he won and was preparing to spend the money… bam… that rug was pulled out from under him. He never really found the focus in the UA deal, where he had the funding for 10 $10m films over 3 years, but MGM/UA was unstable after the first year of that. Still, willing to give him some blame there too. And he has spent the last couple of years making his newest film in Romania with digital cameras, a nearly no name cast, and his own money invested. I guess Rush & Molloy didn’t bother to consider that challenge.
More than any of the other 70s directors, Coppola has tried to change the film world for the better. He has had more impact than any of them with the breakthrough use of video assist (for better or worse). He has spent years of his life chasing projects that turned out to be ghosts. But he has chased them.
Attacks of FFC are classic “we only understand what we see” gamesmanship. No filmmaker of his generation has anything close to the legacy of he, Lucas, and Spielberg. All three of those men live under the weight of those legacies. Of the three, Coppola has remained the greatest risk taker of the group. And let’s not forget that Apocalypse Now only exists because he risked it all… or that the original Zoetrope, which sought to give unexpected filmmakers a chance, put him in the hole for a decade.
The only filmmaker today who has been ambitious the way Coppola was/is is Redford via his Sundance universe.
So… does someone want to talk about how thrilled we all are with DeNiro’s choices in the last five years? Nicholson is still Nicholson. And Pacino may or may not be cheap, but he actually did invest himself in the theater and some small, personal films in the last five years, so he deserves more of a break than the other two, in my opinion.
Gossips commenting on gossips… shed a tear for journalism.
lex,
i spent a lot of years spinning my wheels about not being a guild member, and what i came to realize is that your worth is measured in far more than affiliations to guilds and level of success within the film industry.
On any given day, i can feel like i’m successful or like a total failure based on how the entertainment industry works. I think everyone creative gets to a point where they want to pull their hair out (mine fell out), but i have to wonder if you’d enjoy watching movies more if you didn’t think you needed to write about them.
What if you did write for a free DVD site? Would you enjoy it? would a paycheck make it more enjoyable?
RDP is right. Just being in the guild isn’t exactly the end of the road. Neither is a SAG card. A friend of mine was in a wide release last weekend, has been on a hit TV show, has his SAG card and still stresses about the next gig and the next paycheck. It’s easy to sit back and look at things you want and think that once you attain them that the problems vanish, but that’s not true for 99% of the people in the business.
I’d hate to think how i’d feel if i viewed my success in life by my success in the film business.
i forgot my final thought:
the grass is always greener. my brother has won two emmys and works a job where he makes good money, and at times i think ‘man, that guy has it all’. but when i talk to him, he’s always saying how he wishes he had a more creative job like i do.
so don’t fret. everyone goes through it to some degree.
Lex, this town and the business is completely warped. You know that. No advice on this end, though I too have had to deal with a bunch of failure out here, even though I have a manager and have had very limited success with scripts. However, I have stopped writing b/c i realized that this ‘dream’ isn’t really for me. Why should I hang on to it for it’s own sake? I now work in both a creative and producorial role in the dvd special features market, and I like it quite a bit. I’ve stopped beating myself about the past. Living in the present is infinitely more rewarding.
On an equally enriching note, last night i watched Short Cuts for the first time since it came out. I had forgotten how much fun it was. Of course I was thinking about PTA’s Magnolia while watching it, and man was that film pretensious, not to mention a blatant rip-off in so many ways. ANYWAYS, when it got to the scene where Modine and Julianne Moore are arguing, and she’s panty-less for 3 minutes, 2 thoughts came to mind: (1) Man, she’s hot, and (2) was Altman a dirty old guy?
I often wonder if it was Karma that was the impetus for the disasters that plagued Coppola on the set of Apocalypse Now. Because he flat out bogarted that movie from Lucas and John Milius.
That was George’s dream project since college and Coppola just flat out took it from him while Lucas was under him at Zoetrope.
Even though they’re still very tight, I don’t think Lucas ever really forgave him for that.
And Dave, while I don’t have the time to get into an argument of semantics of “Film for the better” which you may twist it into, I think the facts are clear that Lucas has done a lot more than any of the 70’s generation to make film for the better.
My neighbor wouldn’t be shooting and cutting his feature right out of his spot next door on HD, if it wasn’t for Lucas.
There is no way you would be doing your digitial productions; getting all the name faces in the game you’ve been getting, building up that nice a and deserved acclaim you’ve been building and being able to afford it – would never be happening if Lucas hadn’t used Star Wars to bankroll and push that technology. Along with computer animation, along with creating non-linear editing and multi-channel surround sound. (The quality of the films themselves is a different matter)
Now Dave, please go and enjoy a nice warm glass of shut the fuck up. (Just kidding. I couldn’t help it. My friend threw that out the other night and it cracked me up. I had to throw it down here for all other to proliferate and enjoy)
And Lex, the game is changing. This is not the NFL or modeling. There is no age limit to this game. So stop crying in your whiskey (alcohol is a depressant)
Here you go people:
HOW TO MAKE IT AS AN ACTOR IN THIS GAME.
1. Go to an acting class.
Baseball players don’t bat .500 if they don’t go to the batting cages, and actors aren’t actors unless they’re always working or in class. If you’re not playing your instrument, you will get actors atrophy. Class is good because you’ll hone your game and you’ll network. Take a scene study class; take a On Camera acting class, Go take an Improv class like at Improv Olympic (everyone coming out of that place is booking work)
Get into as many student films at USC or UCLA or AFI or wherever and build yourself up some tape. Also, you never know when some hotshot from one of those schools is going to break. And if you’re cool to work with, they might throw you a bone later because of the familiarity.
Go for any local independent productions. (Like I said, my neighbor is shooting a feature next door. This happens all over LA and I’m sure around the rest of the world as the technology gets more affordable. Thank you uncle George!)
Repeat this process until you build up 3 minutes of “good” tape.
Get into a play, anywhere. When you do, send tickets, tape, and a nice short professional and concise letter saying you’re seeking representation and invite them to the show. Get the book on legit agents at Sam French and hit all the ones that accept newer talents. Expect them not to show up. It doesn’t matter.
Which leads to one of, if not the most important things one needs to do to obtain and maintain a successful acting career…
Don’t be an asshole. Seriously. Los Angeles may be a big city, but this is a small town. And the higher up you get, the smaller the town gets. That is the best advice I’ve ever gotten from a very successful academy award winning producer.
Don’t believe me? I’ll give you an example. I met a girl that moved in next door to my spot. She is a moderately successful television producer.
Within two phone calls I knew everything about her. That she used sex to advance her career, who she slept with, how much partying she did on set and off. What substances she abused; what people used to call her before she got cosmetic enhancements, how the men in her company all wanted her after she got them, how she was cool when she was in the trenches with the camera guys and how she turned into a bitch when she got her promotion. Two phone calls.
It’s a small town. Don’t be an asshole, and they have no ammo to talk shit about you.
Believe in yourself and have some faith. How the fuck is the universe going to bring it to you if you just sit with poopy pants and believe you’re a failure? Instead of recognizing that you’re made from the same energy that holds the planets in space, so a part in a movie should be no big fucking deal.
Faith and Belief.
If you rinse and repeat that and stick to it, you will make it as an actor in this game. I guarantee it.
Don’t party (once every two weeks is okay) and rinse and repeat the above – you will eventually book.
“He got caught up in the Peter Pan thing for YEARS and even after he won and was preparing to spend the money… ”
you meant to say PINOCCHIO, right?
“Baseball players don’t bat .500 if they don’t go to the batting cages”
Baseball players don’t bat .500 even when they go to the batting cages. 🙂
that 5 was supposed to be a 3…
Go Rockies!
i don’t know where this right wing has it in for clooney comes from (although, admittedly i don’t follow stories like that). however, my dad called me last night raving about clooney and this movie and he is very much a conservative. he even went to it with his beloved red sox playing what could have been the final game of the season!
so, THX, go rockies, but may my sox see them there!
Dave,
First of all, I agree with most of your post in that most people who write of films due to what they perceive as bad box office results don’t know what they’re talking about. That said…
I think I misunderstood your post. Was your statement that: “A gread total of ZERO of the BP noms from the year before ever had a weekend as good.” referring to gross or per screen average? I mean, did you mean to say that none of the best picture nominees from ’06 or ’05 EVER had a weekend gross higher than Clayton’s gross of $1,077,207, or where you referring to per screen average?
Best,
Mark
“Hey, is it some sort of rule that every 3am Skinemax movie now has to star the same fucking cast? Evan Stone, Beverly Lynne, Christine Nguyen, Nicole Sheridan, Alexandre Boisvert seem to be in constant, endless, joyless rotation at all hours of the night, every night.”
The reason is this… Playboy is responsible for most — if not all — soft core flicks on the pay cable channels. Playboy has had a relationship with this group of actours and actresses for a while. So they let them do all of these movies. The same goes for those folks in Canada who do those Spider-Babe and LOTR soft-core flicks. There’s your answer.
Nevertheless; miserable show business stories? Come on folks: chin-up. Sometimes you have to be Steve Kerr because there’s only one Michael Jordan. That’s the way it goes.
frank grillo started on one of those skinemax type films and now he’s doing series regular roles on network shows
By the way; Michael Clayton is a hell of a film. Also… Heat has issues with Lucas. He just has people with problems, in case you did not know :)>.
Or problems with people… yeah… that’s the ticket.
30 DAYS OF NIGHT people…30 days of HOLY SHIT that was great!! Even the quadruplet 14 year olds talking through it couldn’t ruin a truly great ADULT horror movie.