May 5, 2024
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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
Never mind.
FRINGE will be BACK in 70 SECONDS. Fringe will be BACK in 90.84 seconds. Really?? How long will that stupidity last? I can barely take a piss and refill my scotch in that time. ALSO that’s Molly Dodd in the role of the cranky woman at the evil company! Holy shite.
I met Poland at the Disney event. He was very nice.
I actually saw the lobby poster for An American Carol tonight. Real subtle stuff: The faux Michael Moore has a video camera in one hand, a humongous sandwich in the other. Wow, the guy’s overweight. What funny stuff.
Why do I get the feeling I’m going to see the Plan 9 from Outer Space of right-wing political satires?
That implies that there was at one point a Day the Earth Stood Still of right-wing political satires.
I MADE A POINT EARLIER TODAY THAT I WOULD LIKE TO HAVE ACKNOWLEDGED BECAUSE IT IS SPOT-ON.
I am absolutely predicting that either SPIELBERG, BRUCKHEIMER, or BAY will cast KRISTEN STEWART very shortly. They all have a history of casting THE NEXT BIG THING right at the precise moment, and surely they all realize that TWILIGHT is going to have a 55 MILLION DOLLAR OPENING DAY and a 125 MILLION DOLLAR OPENING WEEKEND.
THE BERG is surely going to cast her sooner than later, no? He ALWAYS snaps up the next big sensation right when they’re hitting their biggest.
I tell you people, it’s APRIL 1977 and STAR WARS is about to drop, is about to CHANGE THE FACE OF CINEMA AND HOW WE SEE MOVIES, and none of you are even prepared for the SENSATION that TWILIGHT is going to be.
This shit is going to make HARRY POTTER look like HOWARD THE DUCK.
Literally every woman in this country is going to see it. It’s going to be the biggest thing EVER.
1.25 BILLION BY MARCH 1ST, MARK MY WORDS.
Look out, Titanic, you’re about to get your blue-tinted, black-and-white tuxedos that look like True Lies’ color scheme ass FUCKING OWNED.
Also where I posted this brilliant bit of prognostication, some village idiot opined that TWILIGHT, THE BIGGEST MOVIE EVENT OF ALL TIME, is in trouble because something called MADAGASCAR 2 comes out that week.
I am not saying this to be disingenuous, but WHAT THE FUCK is MADAGASCAR 1, let alone MADAGASCAR 2?
WHO IN THEIR RIGHT MIND GIVES A FLYING ASSFUCK about anything that’s ANIMATED? If you’re over the age of, say, 10 and even KNOW WHAT MADAGASCAR IS, you have some serious problems.
GROW UP AND BE A GODDAMN MAN.
CARTOONS ARE FOR KIDS.
I vaaaaaaaaaaaguely remember something being called Madagascar, but wasn’t it one of those VALIANT-style nobody gives a shit C-list toons that flopped? Why do I not remember this shit AT ALL? Oh, yeah, because I’m 35 years old and not a DOUCHEBAG.
WHEN THE HELL DID ADULTS START PAYING AAAAANY ATTENTION to cartooooons?
Can you really picture your rolling crew, your drunk uncle, your convict cousins, your Lee Marvin esque grandpa SITTING AROUND ON MOVIE NIGHT WATCHING FUCKING RATATOOOOOOOUILLE?
If you’re ANY KIND OF MAN and have paid money to watch RATATOUILLE, you are a fucking hopeless, lost-cause A#1 DOUCHEBAG.
Christ, you should be watching BAD LIEUTENANT or something, not some cartoon bullshit.
Right now I’m thinking about your dad and condoms.
(with thanks to Vice magazine).
I don’t even know what that means.
And stop pretending you don’t find me amusing. I’m practically your raaaaaaaison d’eeeetre at this point.
I’m genuinely curious how I rank against IO and Chucky on your hate-o-meter. 60% of the time we’re perfectly civil with each other and I maintain we agree on more stuff than you like to admit.
ANYWAY, THIS WEEKEND IS GOING TO OWN:
CHOKE (FUCK YEAH), SANTA ANNA (166 MINUTES????? HOLY SHIT), and EAGLE EYE DAWSON AND CHIKLIS COMMAND YOUR ASS.
BIGGEST MOVIEGOING WEEKEND OF THE YEAR.
KRISTEN STEWART, IF YOU READ THIS BLOG, WHAT IS UP HOTNESS EMAIL ME YOU ROCK.
Watch out, LexG is on the piss again.
Lex, I enjoy agreeing with you, when you’re agreeable, which is too rare.
I consider you less mentally ill than Chucky or IO, but more selfish and whiny. They need medication, you need therapy.
You won’t believe this, or maybe you will, but I actually rather like jeff lately. Probably a decent guy; I picture him chronically facepalming over my more strident idiocy, but sneaking suspicion he’s an OK enough guy in the real (if too literal minded and serious), and it should be obvious I’m a much nicer person than my idiot persona suggests.
Nah, take that back, I’m kind of an asshole in any form.
GET READY TO CALL THE AP BECAUSE THE GREATEST QUOTE OF ALL TIME IS ABOUT TO BE DROPPED:
I WANT TO SNORT FUN-DIP OFF OF KRISTEN STEWART’S TOES.
FUCK YEAH.
Lex’s posts read like lazy blog inspired performance art.
Just apply a simple question to his posts:
What does this statement or observation bring to the conversation.
99% of the time the answer would be nothing.
If you wrote a computer script that only typed in CAPS and randomly generated sentences made out of words like OWNED, FUCK, and LEXG, you’d basically get the same experience he brings to the blog.
He’s like an AICN talkbacker who got lost and ended up on the wrong site. I used to find it generally inoffensive, but christ almighty man, can you find somewhere else to bludgeon this dead horse? It’s not even that i find it offensive, just unoriginal. You’re like the web equivalent of Arli$$. Sure, you try real hard, but your output is excruciating.
Maybe i need to talk to him in a language he understands:
FAIL
Lex, I’ll take some of this bait, because when you’re not screaming about how amazing it is that sometimes lady actresses are hot, and making extremely poor box-office predictions, you have sort of an interesting point of view. But I don’t get the animation hate, which seems to sit right on the line between your actual taste and your hollered exaggeration of same.
In your parlance, The Incredibles and Wall-E and the best Pixar movies OWN. I mean, you were ranting about the VISCERAL before — Pixar movies are often extremely visceral. Ratatouille is more visually exciting and kinetic than at least half of the big-time Hollywood action movies i see. I’m all for the visceral and have myself championed, at times, the pleasing-to-my-inner-fifteen-year-old aesthetic. I’d rather watch a Jason Statham B-movie than a high-toned Masterpiece Theater bonnet movie any day. And I’d often happily argue for the Statham movie’s superiority (if it’s a Transporter or Crank movie, anyway). But this kind of blanket endorsement of “if it has guns going off, that fucking rules”… really? Are you that literal-minded? Can you really not tell the difference between a fucking awesome shoot-em-up and a fucking lame one? Your ranting would have more impact if you gave the impression that you could.
BTW, temper your expectations — Choke is not so good… but it is better than the book, which I sort of hated. I’d imagine you love Palahniuk, though, even/especially if you don’t read.
Jesse, all animation is the same. Just not for me, sorry.
CHOKE IS GOING TO OWN YOUR ASS.
Even HEAVY METAL or BEOWULF or, uh, Wizards?
Beowulf pretty much blew but Jolie gave me a boner and Winstone looked like Sean Bean, which was kinda cool.
And I’m sure you’ve all waited with bated breath for a new post on this, but I watched my copy of Snow Angels a second time, and it indeed is the 2nd best movie of 2008.
ROCKWELL AND BECKINSALE deserve nominations.
You don’t seem like the kind of person for whom ‘gave me a boner’ is a real challenge along the lines of ‘helped me learn to speak Arabic’ or ‘cured my colorblindness’.
I just saved this thread so we can review some of these predictions when Twilight actually comes out and does nowhere near the business Lex is predicting.
It’ll be a hit, I’m sure – but jeez, man…. either lower or increase your dosage, because something is seriously off.
The most pathetic part about Lex (which makes it incredibly fucking pathetic) is when he talks about his “persona.” Either do a persona or shut up about it.
I thought Forgetting Sarah Marshall was an okay movie, but who needs 3 (!) discs worth of special-edition extras?
I believe it was Lex who said the last X-Files movie would be huge and that I (and others) just couldn’t tell because we don’t visit the right pop culture websites. So, ya know, box office predictions aren’t exactly his strong point. Neither is rationality.
Hey, I’ll cop to plenty of awesomely dumb box-office predictions, but I never said that about X-Files (nor have I ever seen a single episode of X-Files.)
The prediction stands:
TWILIGHT OPENING DAY: 55 MIL.
TWILIGHT OPENING WEEKEND: 125 MIL.
And that’s being conservative.
It’s going to be the biggest thing you’ll see in your lifetime. BANK ON IT.
Is this ‘rational Lex’ or ‘horny for jailbait Lex’?
I love how LexG thinks a movie based on a book series that has sold 1/40 the copies Harry Potter has is going to be bigger than the Harry Potter movies. That math is so atrocious even I can spot it.
“WHEN THE HELL DID ADULTS START PAYING AAAAANY ATTENTION to cartooooons?” Maybe when they started drawing them?
Madagascar 2 is released 11/7. Quantum of Solace is released 11/14. Twilight is released 11/21. Yeah, that’s such a great position to be in, agains the third and second weekends of those two flicks. Bolt also opens 11/21. It may not do gangbusters, but unless it’s a complete flop like Igor it will eat into Twilight’s audience. Twilight could be a moderate hit, or it could be a repeat of the movie based on that dragon book whose name I can’t remember. That had a huge following. How many zillions did it make at the box office? Oh, that’s right, none. Lex could be right, but at the same time, no one should be surprised if we see headlines about how Twilight’s box office performance left it in the, sorry, twilight.
BOLT looks dreary, but it IS Disney, so it’s not likely to meet IGOR’s fate. Also, one of the star voices is Miley Cyrus, who has some overlap with the teen-girl demo of TWILIGHT.
Cadavra’s prediction: $9 million OD, $25 million OW. Jack that up $2 million if there are Thursday midnight shows.
I won’t play the numbers game, but I think Twilight will be huge. I don’t know what the tracking is, and I don’t know how many of the books have sold. But sales isn’t the whole story with books — they get passed around or checked out of libraries, too. And of course lots of folks who haven’t read them will still see the movie. And it should be a big date movie for the younger set.
I can’t see any of Miley Cyrus’ teen demo choosing Bolt over Twilight. And tweens love stuff that’s aimed at a slightly older demo. Makes ’em feel more mature. Bolt will do fine with kids and families, and might get some tweens and teens when they’re turned away from sold out Twilight shows.
I’m thinking about reading the first book, just to see what the fuss is about. My gf, who’s 25, just finished all four and has started re-reading the first. Something’s striking a chord.
“But sales isn’t the whole story with books — they get passed around or checked out of libraries, too.”
No, sales aren’t the whole story with books. But they are indicative of box office potential. What Twilight is trying is pretty rare: going from a one-quadrant publishing success to a multiple-quadrant movie success. And make no mistake, Twilight’s audience is one quadrant. It is almost exclusively female, mostly tweens and their moms. That’s even a narrow segment of all females. The movie is going to have to get a much broader audience than reads the books in order to be successful. Otherwise, it’s just another Traveling Pants.
The Harry Potter movies are not as successful as the books. But they are considered great successes. Why? Because when you have 400 million copies in print, even if only a fifth or a sixth of the people who have read the books see the movies, you’re going to do gangbusters. A fifth or a sixth of 10 million, not so much. Yes, there are libraries and books do get passed around. But again, 400 million vs. 10 million. What do you think is getting checked out and passed around more?
“Something’s striking a chord.” What it needs is a symphony.
re: the ‘valkyrie’ trailer, i’m not usually a cruise-basher but his extremely american accent sticks out like a sore thumb amidst the more appropriate european brogues of his fellow cast mates. cruise’s voice sounds so glaringly ‘odd man out’, couldn’t he have cultivated a touch of the german, english, or at the very least a trans-atlantic style a la viggo’s ‘aragorn’, just to blend in a little? his irish brogue in ‘far and away’ is a bit shit but at least he gave it a go, i’m suprised singer let it slide. or maybe that sort of thing doesn’t bug the crap out of other people like it does me.
No, it bugs me, too. I call it Ronald Colman Syndrome: people with English accents playing Europeans, particularly French and Italians (after the wonderful actor who did it so often–e.g., A TALE OF TWO CITIES, IF I WERE KING).
Yeah, it should at least be consistent. They should all do German like in Schindler’s List, or all sound British or American.
(In 300, the Spartan king was Scottish — and it sounded stupid as shit.)
This is Cruise’s Robin Hood. As in Costner.
They must have heard Cruise try a German or ‘British’ accent and decided that just flat American English was less distracting.
well, there’s a niggling part of me that believes one of the marks of a true thespian is the ability to cultivate an accurate and believable accent as required to inhabit a role…but maybe i’m just being a prat
You’re talking about an ‘actor’ and Cruise has rarely been one of those, but rather a ‘movie star’. Granted, there are those who can do both, like the late Mr. Newman.
There have been a few respectable actor/star types who can’t do accents. Connery always uses his own voice. He can’t even manage Irish.
Michael Caine almost always sounds like himself. He did upper-class Brit in Zulu way back at the beginning of his career, and he played South African president F.W. de Klerk. But for ninety-eight percent of his career, he’s been Michael Caine.
Nicholson is another. Even in The Passenger, in which he was supposed to have been English, he talked like Jack. There was some excuse about his having been educated in the U.S., but c’mon.
Even DeNiro, great as he was in his early days, has never been proficient at accents. He spoke Italian in GFII, and I guess he did a passable Chicagoan in Untouchables. But have you seen Cape Fear lately? Cartoon Appalachian, which drops out completely at the end of the scene in which Nolte is hiding behind the dumpster. His Frankenstein monster was even worse.
Not that I’m really disagreeing with your point, Leah. All of the actors I’ve mentioned have shown a great deal more range — or at least natural ability — than Cruise. I’d be more willing to let him slide if he had impressed me more in the past.
i actually think i was being a bit of a prat. some great actors seem to be able to do accents easily and some don’t. streep’s ability with accents has always amazed me, tho her aus twang in ‘a cry in the dark’ is a bit dodgy (kam might have an opinion on that one). anthony hopkins’ kiwi in ‘world’s fastest indian’ is flat-out hilarious, but i actually enjoy him in the role.
i think cruise is fantastic in ‘magnolia’. i cling to that performance and a few others as proof that tom can pull one out out of the fire under the right circumstances.
in the vein of ‘the spartan king was scottish’ ridiculousness, connery’s scottish brogue while playing a spaniard in ‘highlander’ is also a hoot.
Hopkins! I’m glad you brought him up.
Generally, classically-trained Brits are better at accents than are most Americans, and Sir tony has a reputation as a great mimic. But I’ve never thought that he was particularly skilled at doing accents. This wouldn’t matter as much if he were a “star” type known for his personality — but his reputation was built as a chameleon-like character actor.
Did anyone see his Picasso? The movie got mostly lousy reviews, so I didn’t bother, but I’m having a very hard time imagining it.
good point about the brits, frankb. funnily enough, an english actress friend of mine once told me the hardest accent to master is the american, because of the vowels. (the only thing that stands out in my memory of hopkins’ picasso are his freaky brown eyes)
It seems like even the Brit actors who are best at American accents will get tripped up on some little word like “been,” which they’ll invariably pronounce the Brit way (“bean”) as opposed to the American way (“ben”). It’s reminiscent of all the Canadian actors who sound fairly convincing as Americans until the “aboots” start flying.
I just saw this trailer tonight and immediately I could tell that Tom Cruise’s performance is going to be the weak link in this particular chain.