BYOB 102908
It’s Wednesday… and Bond shows tonight… and AFI launches tomorrow night… and Che’ in The Chinese on Saturday…
Ahhhhhh….
April 16, 2024
BYOB
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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
Obama’s spot hit at the right points. People are broke. People need help. McCain is offering the same. Obama equals change. So let us see where the hell this goes.
And THE LOST SKELETON RETURNS AGAIN a week from Sunday at the Egyptian!
Bow to the bony one!
Really looking forward to that Che-nese screening.
1:36 AM and SCARFACE is OWNING up one of the Encore channels.
BEST. MOVIE. EVER. FUCKING. MADE.
(Beyond the structural flaw where the last hour of a three-hour epic seems to take place on the same day.)
I watch this shit like 134 times a year and it NEVER GETS OLD. FUCKING TOTAL WHOLESALE MASSIVE MEGAOWNAGE.
I bring this up because Len Maltin STILL TO THIS DAY has this AMERICAN CLASSIC down in his book as a “1 and a half star” movie.
Anyone think Maltin might wanna update some of those dated, ancient opinions? Blade Runner is also down as a 1 1/2er too. Shining is a 2-star in that book.
I realize it’s kind of a group opinion, but some of these movies are old enough now to warrant a reappraisal.
HOLY SHIT THIS PART WHERE TONY’S DRIVING ***MARK FUCKING MARGOLIS*** AROUND NYC and they have BUDWEISER CANS on the dash is the GREATEST THING EVER.
IF GOD WAS A MOVIE, HE’D BE SCARFACE.
TONY MONTANA FUCKING OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWNS.
Because all my fans will want to TAKE NOTES, Lex’s TOP TEN MOVIES OF ALL TIME FOR OWNAGE:
1. SCARFACE.
2. BOOGIE NIGHTS.
3. FIGHT CLUB.
4. TAXI DRIVER.
4. THE SHINING.
5. TOP GUN.
6. GOODFELLAS.
7. THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY.
8. THE GODFATHER PART II.
9. ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA.
10. NATURAL BORN KILLERS.
FUCK. YEAH.
FUN TRIVIA:
SCARFACE dropped on the same day as SUDDEN IMPACT– DECEMBER 9, 1983.
I was 11 years old and too young to see either, but they represented like the HOLY GRAIL of moviegoing. I studied every review I could my hands on knowing that OWNAGE was in store.
When they hit HBO a year or so later, I watched both like 200 times each.
Anyone who was old enough to see SCARFACE on the silver screen in its original run OOOOOWWWWWWNS.
Did you know you were witnessing the GREATEST MOVIE EVER MADE?
Nice list Lex, but Top Gun? Really?
not a bad list, lex (‘cept ‘top gun’. jesus h louise)
are you talking sheer gnarlyness? if so, some of my other faves for kick-assedness in their genre (which of course will change by tomorrow, which is why i don’t like making lists so i don’t know why i’m making this one, but what the hell, it’ll be quick and painless):
once were warriors
trainspotting
the terminator
a clockwork orange
se7en
aliens
the road warrior (max 2)
texas chainsaw massacre and/or halloween or both
the thing (carpenter’s)
die hard
the fly (cronenberg’s)
near dark
reservoir dogs
bad taste
midnight express
the deer hunter
wow that’s way more than ten. oh well, best not dwell or i’ll drive myself even more batty than i already am
how can i post as the same time as someone at 3 frikin 04 (your time) in the morning? i didn’t copy off aladdin’s paper, we must be a bit onagi, i guess
Leahz list is pretty good but I would like to add 48 Hours and French Connection into the conversation. Two Hardass movies that would never be made today since the casual racism of the charectors would never pass no matter how realistic it is. And Natural Born Killers wishes it was half the movie that Full Metal Jacket is.
But Lex, Top Gun? Between that and your twilight fixation you might need to get yourself fitted for some pig tails and a Hello Kitty backpack. I understand needing to have Tony Scott on some sort of ownage list but Enemy of the State, Man on Fire and Last Boy Scout are far superior to Top Gun. Of course you may simply need to have a Tom Cruise movie on your list but Collateral, War of the Worlds, or the first MI movie are better highlights of his talents. He only reaches his cruisiest when sprinting or smiling, I don’t recall him doing either in TG.
And at the end of a variety article on Rudin yesterday it was mentioned that the Coen Brothers might be working on a remake of True Grit. Not thrilled by another remake (Ladykillers was their weakest film), but I can’t wait to see what these guys do with an actual western.
PHILLIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
At last the Philly championship drought is over. It will be a day long remembered. Until late December, when Philly fans are booing Andy Reid to death for another display of boneheaded clock (mis)management. I sure hope Reid was watching the game last night. It’d do him some good to see what it looks like when the coach plays to win.
I never saw Scarface untill just a couple years ago. By then, I had already played the Grand Theft Auto game that lifted so heavily from the movie. So, watching it, ended up feeling like the best video game based movie ever, but still bored me, having pretty much seen it all in various digital vignettes.
TOP GUN?
Jeesus.
and ‘spring awakening’ opens tonight at the ahmanson….it’s like high school musical for almost grown-ups…..
Maltin should reconsider some of those just so he doesn’t look like an idiot, just as Ebert still owes the world a retraction of his infamously squeamish Blue Velvet review.
He should write it up for his Great Movies series to balance the scales and redeem himself.
Nice list, Leah. Your Eighties is showing, but any list of mine would lean that way, too. There’s just something about the films you see in your twenties…however, I’d pick Braindead/Dead Alive over Bad Taste as far as P.J. Goes.
Top Gun…snicker…
my 80’s ARE showing, lol, i see that in the cold light of day. i’m burning the candle at both ends so my memory is shot to hell.
(just under 1/3 seventies titles and no 60’s or earlier…pretty bad)
if i had it to do over, my list would be all different anyway (i’d pick ‘meet the feebles’ over ‘bad taste’ to give the list some nifty pj satire, but i just watched ‘the taste’ the other night and it was fresh in my head – plus say what you will about it, ‘bat taste’ is fucking gross so it falls into the ‘gnarly’ category a bit better perhaps). i’d put the ‘dawn of the dead’ remake on there (esp. the extended one), it’s absolutely badass. plus the velvet. night of the living dead. exorcist/omen. deliverance. night of the hunter, definitely. i don’t know, i’m fried. confucius say, ‘never go back and change a list’
Did anyone else notice Lex can’t count? His Top 10 is actually 11 (two #4s).
well spotted, cadavra, i vote you be posted as lookout
Its his homage to Spinal Tap
Hahaha!
CHE FUCKING OWNED.
Even better than the movie was repeatedly seeing Jeff Wells skulking around looking every bit as awesome, grumpy and intimidating as he reads.
Awesome movie… Maybe Dave’ll throw up an AFI thread… or maybe that’s too niche. Reminded me a lot of Traffic in terms of cool tone and reserve combined with total technical accomplishment. The intermission is pretty effective, as part 2 is in a different aspect ratio, different tinting, even feels like a different genre; I think it gets lost for about 45 minutes in a Full Metal Jacket kinda way somewhere around the 2:45 mark, with lots of unclear jungle skulking when Che and Franke Potente get split up.
Rallied totally toward the end, though… maybe a little aloof (as is typical for Soderbergh), but undeniably impressive achievement.
It’s funny because every time I see Jeff Wells he just looks like another Hollywood street person, disheveled and muttering to himself crankily.