By David Poland poland@moviecitynews.com

Page 6

Link to the List

Pete Hammond
Maxim

1 American Gangster
2 The Bourne Ultimatum
3 Control
4 Diving Bell and the Butterfly
5 In the Valley of Elah
6 Michael Clayton
7 No Country for Old Men
8 Ratatouille
9 There Will Be Blood
10 Zodiac
Link to the List

David Edelstein
Fresh Air

1 Diving Bell and the Butterfly
2 Away From her
3 There Will Be Blood
4 Sweeney Todd
5 The Savages
6 No Country for Old Men
7 No End in Sight
8 Michael Clayton
9 Ratatouille/Persepolis
10 Grace is Gone
Link to the List

David Ansen
Newsweek

1 Syndromes and a Century
2 There Will Be Blood
3 This is England
4 The Lives of Others
5 No Country for Old Men
6 Knocked Up
7 Diving Bell and the Butterfly
8 Away From Her
9 The Hoax
10 Sweeney Todd
Link to the List

Lou Gaul
Philly Burbs

1 No Country for Old Men
2 Atonement
3 Charlie Wilson’s War
4 Diving Bell and the Butterfly
5 Gone Baby Gone
6 The Great Debaters
7 Into the Wild
8 Juno
9 Once
10 Sweeney Todd
Link to the List

Alison Willmore
IFC News

1 No Country for Old Men
2 Rescue Dawn
3 There Will Be Blood
4 Killer of Sheep
5 Southland Tales
6 Syndromes and a Century
7 Paprika
8 Control
9 Romance & Cigarettes
10 The Host
Link to the List

Michael Atkinson
IFC News

1 Syndromes and a Century
2 Once
3 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
4 Half Moon
5 There Will Be Blood
6 Regular Lovers
7 Killer of Sheep
8 12:08 East of Bucharest
9 Los Muertos
10 Michael Clayton
Link to the List

Matt Singer
IFC News

1 No Country for Old Men
2 Diving Bell and the Butterfly
3 The King of Kong
4 Zodiac
5 The Host
6 Hot Fuzz
7 Into the Wild
8 Syndromes and a Century
9 There Will Be Blood
10 Black Book
Link to the List

Milan Paurich
Cleveland Free Times

1 Into the Wild
2 There Will Be Blood
3 Juno
4 I’m Not There
5 Zodiac
6 The Savages
7 No Country for Old Men
8 Diving Bell and the Butterfly
9 Brand Upon the Brain
10 Once
Link to the List

Marshall Fine
Star Magazine

1 No Country for Old Men
2 Michael Clayton
3 Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
4 Gone Baby Gone
5 The Lives of Others
6 Sicko
7 The Darjeeling Limited
8 Grindhouse
9 Ratatouille
10 Knocked Up
Link to the List

Stephen Holt
Stephen Holt Show

1 Atonement
2 Once
3 Crazy Love
4 Across the Unverse
5 Persepolis
6 Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
7 The Savages
8 The Kite Runner
9 Sicko
10 Enchanted

Michael Atkinson | David Ansen | David Edelstein | Marshall Fine | Lou Gaul | Pete Hammond | Stephen Holt | Milan Paurich | Matt Singer | Alison Willmore

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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