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
I think you have a spoiler in these remarks, for people who aren’t acquainted with history.
Incredible year for Gus Van Sant.
Good to know that this film looks as freakin classy as it does from that trailer. Easily one of the better trailers this entire year.
“For the first time in my memory, we have a major Oscar movie that actually is a gay agenda movie.”
Well, not according to what some poeple said about The Hours.
“Sean Penn gives an Oscar lock performance of power and subtlety that ranks with the best of his career.”
Watch out DP, Eric Childress is gonna ring you up for quote-whoring!! (j/k Eric)
Spoiler? Please. That’s like the woman who called my paper to complain we’d given away the ending of “Romeo and Juliet.”
I’m feelin’ some award momentum for this one. The thin crop and residual egg still dripping down the academy’s face after that CRASH debacle could put Van Sant in a pretty sweet spot come Feb.
i am looking forward to ‘milk’ so very, very much.
crap, terminally tired but i also meant to say re: brolin, ‘chig’ didn’t exactly elicit empathy (unless you’re one sick bugger) and bardem won one of those little gold dudes for that role
“got the mixed emotions of a murderer so right”
Had some experience…?
J-Mc… the death of Milk is foretold in the first few minutes of the film.
And only what I have observed in docs and in the psychological profile of people who end up killing, KT. The character is magnificently written and performed (as you saw… don’t know if you agree), avoiding making it into something more simple or less simple than it might have. Van Sant does ambiguity as well as any filmmaker working today and this film is rife with it.
“Please note the following review embargo dates; online is embargoed until Tuesday, November 25th ; weeklies are embargoed until Wednesday, November 19th; and print dailies are embargoed until Wednesday, November 26th.”
No I agree with you. It’s probably his best work to date, including the high-wire act that he offered in “W.”
This looks great, though anyone fear that with the combination of a “gay agenda” (DP’s words) and the presence of favorite neocon punching bag Penn, this will ignite an op-ed and TV talking-points-show firestorm? If so, it could go the route of the Larry Flynt movie, where the critical raves and early buzz eventually got drowned out by the war of words.
Then again, in that case the controversy came more from feminists and (to a lesser degree) P.C. elements in the Left. I assume the whining here will be from the family values crowd. I can already hear the usual suspects foghorning about it being “an attack on traditional American values!” Not sure to what degree the election outcome will affecr whether the biz says screw it and rewards it anyway, OR if they’ll play it safe and avoid courting the controversy by glossing over it.
Van Sant is usually a master, but I had pretty major issues with “Paranoid Park,” so regardless of “Milk’s” expected awesomeness, I’ll disagree with Ethan that this will have been a banner year for GVS.
“PP” just might be my least-favorite Van Sant film. You can argue it has more artistic merit than “Psycho” or “Even Cowgirls,” but even if the aforementioned ambiguity is what he was going after in “Paranoid,” I think ultimately, inherently it comes out squarely on the side of worshipping a stupid, boring, and empty little prick who committed a senseless act without conscience. But that’s OK, because he, like, skateboards, and has cool floppy hair and stuff.
Regardless of what GVS is going for or trying to say, the mere act of filming it and telling the story makes it seem like aging Beatnik Van Sant is condoning the stupid actions of his “protagonist.”
And I liked “Gerry” and “Elephant” very much; “Last Days” much less so, but still respected it. But “Paranoid” is boring and random on top of being queasy. And certainly Van Sant isn’t the first director to romanticize a scene or a character who’s clearly beneath him, nor the first director to idealize his subjects (straight hacks do it all the time, and with very young women as well), nor the first middle-aged director to inadvetantly document what seems like a midlife crisis in doing so.
Just the combined effect of all this is ultimately numbing; Much as I’ve enjoyed some of his other recent experimental works, I like to think there’s a happy medium somewhere between PP and Finding Forrester. And indeed “Milk” looks like it combines his mainstream filmmaking skills with his provocative tendencies to create something pitched more at the level of “My Own Private Idaho.”
In other words, THIS IS GOING TO OWN.
That was very coherent. Still sober, Lex?
DP, I was (in all honesty) just trying to help you avoid what might have been a reader-unfriendly mistake borne of exuberance. If (spoilers?) the movie also makes it clear, to those who don’t already know, not only that Milk gets killed but that Brolin is his murderer, then as Gilda Radner said, never mind.
I’m sure this movie will becoming a lightning rod – that’s partially got to be the point, right? But what I remember about The People vs. Larry Flynt was that the movie itself was kind of softpedaled on the subject of censorship and, in my opinion, too mediocre to get upset about.
lex, you’re freaking me out (will it be dr. lexyll or mr. high(d)?)
i don’t know, ‘private idaho’ is pretty freakin out there; obviously i haven’t seen ‘milk’ but from the preview i saw it looks more like rousing mainstream social commentary with a sinister undertow
(jeff, that gilda radner comment made me all nostalgic and wistful for the funny broads of yore)
With the election and the California Amendment I can see this being the most written about movie of the season. I’m willing to call it having only seen the trailer that Van Sant is taking the oscar this year.
I’ve heard that Roger Ebert didn’t see the movie but is giving it a positive review based on its title.
“Got ‘Milk’?” Got name-checking?
Chucky, you’re stupid.
We’re a long way from predicting a win for anyone, hcat…
Ooh, such good news to hear! Can’t wait for this one – I believe it’s out here in January.
I don’t think Milk’s assassination is a spoiler. It’s like saying who won a war is a spoiler for a movie about it. It’s a part of history and if people don’t know that then why would they go see it?
I saw this trailer in front of ‘W.’ when I was on a trip visiting friends in western pennsylvania, and the crowd seemed to be very moved by the trailer. I have no doubt that this film has the ability to sincerely reach a majority of people who would normally be reticent towards a “gay agenda” film.
I love Van Sant, and have been very interested by his “development” in the past few years; I am very excited about this film, and am even more interested to see if this can reach a wider audience than, say, brokeback mountain.
In comparison to that film, “milk” obviously will be off-limits in terms of MTV movie awards parodies, SNL references, etc… and rightly so, but will this help or hinder the movie? In many ways, brokeback mountain became part of the cultural lexicon for at least a brief period of time. Does “Milk” have the power to transcend whatever “gay agenda” or “oscar bait” epithet that has been imposed upon it?
No no no, I won’t relive the pain of Brokeback Mountain again. Oscar or not, I’m going to love this movie and that’s that. Fortunately, there’s no “black agenda” movie this year for Roger Ebert and Oprah to push.
The right attitude, waterbucket.
Truth is, it still seems likely to me that the movies to beat to win this year are Slumdog Millionaire (seen) and Ben Button (unseen)… not because they are neccessarily “better,” but because they fit the mold better. But you never know…
Well thats the difference between me and you David, if I make a reckless prediction too early in euphoric anticipation of a movie no one cares.
If you do it people will want to remind you of it for years to come.
But I just don’t see many other contenders on the horizon. Slumdog might be absolute brillance but I think the subtitles will be a hinderance when it comes to academy voting. I think that’s a travesty but its a realistic view. Rev Road might be astonishing but I doubt they are going to give Mendes a second oscar, or Clint a third for Gran Torino. Ben Buttons is the great unanswered question and Fincher deserves all the accolades we can give him but to me this doesn’t look like the one that is going to put him over.
But again since I don’t have to rely on my credibility like you do I can make all sorts of wild predictions. Van Sant wins the Oscar, Dow returns to 13,000 by April, McCains get divorced by August.
Hey jeffmcm, I’m not stupid. Name-checking = FAIL.
Okay, now reconcile those two sentences that you just said so that they don’t contradict each other.
Let me just emphasize to Chucky that I find his ‘name-checking’ obsession curious and without apparent merit. If he ever wanted to explain what the basis of his thoughts are, I would LOVE to read them.
Paranoid Park is still probably the best fiction film I’ve seen this year. Anybody who wants a realistic portrayal of teenagers should be pointed to that movie.
yeah, i often take the boy to a huge outdoor skate park here in the city, i sit there and read while he gets munted by the big guys. i usually sit and read behind the climbing wall to get a measure of peace and quiet, but i often overhear the ‘skater boys’ (they won’t know i’m there) and they do indeed sound just like the ‘paranoid park’ kids. the vernacular may be different but the attitude is unmistakably the same. (and i doubt their mothers know their boys kiss them with those potty mouths, little shits. or they do, and just don’t want to face the fact their boys aren’t the angelic little cherubs they once were)
‘Munted’?
i should have made that more clear, it sounds weird. munted, as in creamed, hammered, bowled over. the little guys get run down and pushed aside at the skate park, law of the jungle stuff.
i’m not sure if munted is kiwi in origin, could be english, possibly american. or astrain. (glad to narrow that down for you, jeff, i bet you’re glad you enquired). i’m fairly certain, however, that munted originally meant hammered in the ‘off yer face’ drunk sense (as in, i drank beer out in the sun all afternoon and got absolutely munted), but it has definitely taken on a life of it’s own meaning getting creamed or wiped out, often in a sporting context. (sorry, you can file that under ‘useless things i’ll never have to remember’)
But I just don’t see many other contenders on the horizon. Slumdog might be absolute brillance but I think the subtitles will be a hinderance when it comes to academy voting.
If you do it people will want to remind you of it for years to come.
I won’t relive the pain of Brokeback Mountain again!