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
‘It’s beginning to look like The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 could be what’s missing from this summer’
I don’t know why but it seems nearly impossible to make a bad movie set on a train (Under Seige 2 and Chantanooga Choo Choo being the most obvious exceptions).
Hcat: Did you ever see the remake of The Lady Vanishes with Cybill Shepherd?
hcat: Money Train.
You get 1080p on satellite?
I’m not saying it’s NARROW MARGIN or anything, but UNDER SIEGE 2 is one of the most pleasingly watchable pieces of shit ever, if only for Bogosian. Assumption is the mother of all fuck ups!
Burma: And chance favors a prepared mind.
Joe – I will have to check but Lady Vanishes with Cybil Shepard sounds very tv movieish to me.
Eric – Money Train was a mess but wasn’t primarily set on a train, at least no more than Speed was, it acted more as a Mcguffin than a setting. Now Von Ryan’s Express, Silver Streak, Runaway Train, Transiberian to name a few, all top notch films. I don’t know if its the confined setting or deliberate movement to a destination that does it, but the only other conveyance that comes close to matching a train for a film set is a submarine.
Lady Vanishes was a theatrical — co-starring Elliott Gould, Angela Lansbury and the great Herbert Lom.
My apologies Joe, just looked it up. Hammer film starring Elliot Gould and Cybil Shepard, no wonder it slid under my radar.
Gould man, talk about a fall from Grace, the guy was Altman’s go to guy and all of a sudden he’s doing Matilda, Escape to Athena and live action Disney movies? Make fun of Stallone and Costner all you want but no one fell as far, as quick as Gould did.
Under Siege 2 was wonderful crap. It’s definitely Seagal’s second best effort by miles, after the first Under Siege. How much of Tough Guys was set on a train? I remember thinking it was horrible, and at the time was a 10-year-old who loved everything.
I have a feeling The Hangover has a good shot at I Love You, Man numbers, if not more.
Yeah, people forget just blazing hot he was for a couple years after M*A*S*H. (Of course, that was a different time — an era when a movie like Little Murders would get green-lit by a major studio.) He began a free-fall around 1971, when he walked off the set of a movie in progress. (A movie that, oddly enough, morphed into What’s Up, Doc?) But here’s the odd thing: If you look closely at his IMDB credits, you’ll see that he’s had at least one TV or movie credit for virtually every year since 1968. Really. Now, of course, he has a lot of filler on the resume. But he also has some A-list projects, and a few under-rated gems (The Silent Partner and Busting, to name just two.) More important, he has remained a setadily working actor for more than 40 years. That’s more than you can say for a lot of people who became stars around the time he did.
I agree, Josh… but the buzz on it is bigger than that… as it was for I Love You, Man, actually.
And according to DirecTV, yes, Doug, there is now 1080p… not that anything on there still looks quite as good as Blu.
Yeesh, I didn’t think Transsiberian was a top-notch thriller, it felt stilted and predictable to me.
Horror Express, starring Cushing, Lee, and Savalas, on the other hand…
I constantly wonder what happened to Gould and why no ones given him a reboot role. And no, Soderbergh’s “Oceans” movies don’t count.
I have to think he’s just a dickhead to work with or he pissed someone off in a BIG way. I personally light up whenever Gould is onscreen and wish someone would give the guy an awesome new indie project. What if he was a bad guy in a big tentpole movie? Could be sweeeet…
Uhhh….
?
Well, that’s just it, Don: He pops up in indie stuff all the time that few people bother to see. I admit, even I haven’t yet seen The Caller (which he made with Frank Langella), but the premise of the movie (if not the critical response it generated) makes me want to check it out on DVD.
Meanwhile, Gould keeps chugging along — I recently saw him in a trailer for Uncorked, a movie coming soon to the Hallmark Channel, co-starring JoBeth Williams. And speaking of whatever happened to…?
Sure Gould has always been able to find steady work, so has Sutherland who seems to take the evil old men roles that Christopher Plummer turns down. But he seemed to be a box office presence into the late seventies, I believe he still was above the title in A Bridge to Far even though his part wasn’t that much bigger than king of the extras John Ratzenberger. And then the next year poof, no studio goes near him. Even Burt Reynold’s downward spiral took years to knock him out of the limelight.
They stopped calling Williams when people no longer wanted to see her naked.
How can that be? I still want to see her naked!
Joe: go check out a flick from 1983. She’s at least in her glory in those.
I also would not undersell The Hangover. There seems to be something about it. I do not know what, but it will be surprising.
‘I still want to see her naked! ‘
Oh, you’d just stand there all shy and ask her if she likes fried chicken.
I’m not sure where other film fans put this, but The Darjeeling Limited, I’d put as mediocre at best. It’s not bad. But it sure as hell isn’t that interesting. As far as train movies go.
The Hangover definitely seems to have some buzz about it, a lot of my age group seems jazzed about it. For me, I’m not totally sold. The trailer and TV spots essentially show the same clips, there could be some laughs and it could be a one joke thing that runs out of gas. that said, I probably will go see it and not the comedy it’s opening against… Land of the Lost.
TDL is not even about a train. It’s about three sons living in the shadow of their father, and their abandonment by their mother. The train is just what they like to call SCOPE in the biz.
Actually, there was a period in the 1980s when it seemed like I was interviewing JoBeth Williams every few months. (And not just because she
The only film that is actually about a train is Thomas the Tank Engine. I was just saying that for some reason Trains make wonderful cinematic settings. I seem to be in the minority though.
And with most comedies aiming at the Paul Blart family crowd, I would think the Hangover’s promise of degenerate pratfalls will find an audience. I can’t remember the last Booze and Boobs flick that was released.
‘I was just saying that for some reason Trains make wonderful cinematic settings. I seem to be in the minority though.’
just to say you’re not alone, hcat, i have a thing for train movies, too (my faves are ‘silver streak’ and ‘murder on the orient express’, the 70’s one. and for clever action i like ‘narrow margin’ with hackman and archer)
Well, wait, wasn’t The General about a train? And how about, well, The Train.
BTW: Worse movie set aboard a train ever made: Night Train to Venice. Seriously. Not even Hugh Grant, Malcolm McDowell and skinheads who turn into Dobermans were able to help.
I like Terror Train. Josh I completely agree that Under Siege 2 is wonderful crap.
And, of course, Twentieth Century.
Oh, man, thanks for bringing up those incessant “Glee” ads. Not since “Skin” (“HIS FATHER’S THE DISTRICT ATTORNEY!”) a few years back have I seen a show pimped THAT hard and THAT relentlessly.
Though I do find it amusing that even Fox News shows the ad every eight minutes, seeing as how it appears to be the most flamboyantly gay and un-heartland-friendly TV show in recent memory.
A subject for a BYOB probably, and maybe it’ll sound like a generalization or borderline un-PC to ask, but out of sheer earnest curiosity: Why do seemingly so many gay filmmakers and writers like to make comedic movies and shows about the high-school caste-system?
Not that there aren’t some straight filmmakers who mine the world of high school for laughs, horror and pathos, but “Glee” would appear (sight-unseen) to fall within a subgenre of “catty high school satires” about underdogs and outcasts, with an overriding camp sensibility.
Not begrudging anyone this, and I like a good high-school comedy as much as the next guy… I just know that speaking as a high school nerd/outcast, I never want to think about high school again, and it’s the very LAST thing I’d ever want to make a movie about.
I’ve been getting those “get the most out of your HDTV” messages on DirecTV telling me to switch over to 1080p, but I think it’s still 720 and they’re transitioning.
“Transsiberian” was an above good train flick I thought.
And Gould as Grovers dad in Baumbach’s “Kicking and Screaming” is an outstanding, under the radar performance.
I’d add “Murder on the Orient Express” to the good train list (aside from some flashbacks, it all takes place on the train).
You probably need a new box, Kris. Only one or two generations were built for the 1080p.
Runaway Train is about a train, and it’s running away! HIYYOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!
EMPEROR OF THE NORTH, bitches!
“It’s beginning to look like The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 could be what’s missing from this summer… big, fun, adult… a higher energy Angels & Demons with stars playing into their strengths.”
HAHAHAHAHA.
No.
Everyone here is wrong. Seagal was in two triumphs, released back to back. Marked for Death (Seagal vs VOODOO!!!) and Out for Justice (Seagal after WILLIAM FORSYTHE IN CRACKHEAD MODE!!!) Seriously, Seagal chopping off a voodoo priest’s head…do you get any better than that? Only by having Seagal try out a Jersey accent with tons of great supporting actors and an awesome psycho, and when they meet up in the end he seems like he could be a real matchfor Seagal. Unfortunately they just had Seagal throw the guy around, as usual. Too bad, Van Damme would have let himself get beat up a little, at least.
The only one with better back to back masterpieces is Spielberg with Schindler’s List and Jurassic Park. After that, Seagal.
I saw “Tyson” at the Regal Union Square in NYC yesterday and the first preview was for … “The Hangover”.
Chucky = PURE COMEDY. “Sorry to interrupt your parlor game, fanboys…”
Hey has anyone seen that new Nick Cassavetes movie trailer with Abigail Breslin and Cameron Diaz?
a) Is it humanly possible to pack more uncomfortable and upsetting schmaltz into three minutes?
b) Did Nick C. shoot that shit in like 6.35:1???? Holy fucking widescreen, dude. It’s some little Lifetime movie, and the Auteur here is all busting out vistas and compositions worthy of some 1963 Roman gladiator epic.
Lex – agree with you 100%. I saw that trailer last week and started itching to flee.
i really enjoyed the ‘glee’ pilot but agree with lex that it’s probably too gay for most… the fox over-hype smacks of desperation and i think it’s a real mistake to hold the series for fall…
lex, re: your question — i actually asked ryan murphy (popular, glee) something along those lines
and it seems it’s a matter of control/revenge…being able to address and correct slights that gay kids (or misfits in general) had no power over when actually experiencing them… also, it’s pretty empowering for gay kids to see positive reflections of themselves in a mainstream network show…
Oh, and can anyone explain the Tilda Swinton comment. If it’s meant to imply that she’s a lesbian, I’m doubtful. Having not just one but two concurrent male partners seems like overkill, beard-wise.
Too gay for most? Really? Come on. It’s not 1967. It’s 2009. Also; holding the series to Fall is necessary. It gives FOX the ability to show three episodes of DO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE? a week. Which is important. Really important.
Lex: revenge is a dish best served… via entertainment.
Chris: Tilda appeared at Cannes with a nice looking lady. Who just happened to be wearing a button down shirt and pants compared to Tilda. Who happened to be wearing a gorgeous gown because she’s a gorgeous lady. It’s all about inference. So judge for yourself: http://images.huffingtonpost.com/gadgets/slideshows/1573/slide_1573_21882_large.jpg
i’m aware of the year…i’m also aware of the fact that i’ve seen the show and you haven’t… my opinion stands…
The Tall Target is another great train movie.
I saw the ads for that Steven Seagal flick that premiered on Spike a couple of weeks back. He played a Memphis cop or something, and his attempt at an accent made him sound like he was auditioning for the Stepin Fetchit story. Very strange.
O’Horten is a lovely film about a train-driver. The opening shot is a beautiful one from the front of a train as it goes through the snowy Norwegian countryside. But not really set on a train. Oh well.
Kris, if Dave thinks you look like Sam Worthington then take it as a compliment. Sam is a dish and a half.
my pic for loveliest train movie that doesn’t take place on an actual train: ‘the station agent’. i dig that flick
Wendy Hughes in Warm Nights on a Slow Moving Train = Hot stuff
Sorry Joe, the worst train movie has got to be Chantanooga Choo Choo. In fact that is a film that would take the worst in any catagory it qualified for. It centered on a love triangle between Joe Namath, Barbara Eden and George Kennedy. The big running joke throughout the movie was that Kennedy was wearing a dress on his lower half because he had accidently ingested some exlax and crapped his pants. It was a random cheapie Million Dollar Mystery level production and one of the most god awful films ever run through a projector.
Joe, you’re after my heart.
In regards to other Aussie flicks on trains – if Noise is ever released do yourself a big favour and see it. There’s only one scene on a train, but it’s a doozy.
Hcat: Trust me, Night Train to Venice is much worse. For one thing, it’s totally incoherent. It’s the sort of thing that actually makes you worry while you’re watching it that, without realizing it, you may have suffered a stroke that has impeded your faculties.
Kami: Wendy Hughes is a babe. Even in Careful He Might Hear You, she’s hot. I loved her arc in Homicide: Life on the Street. Haven’t seen her in anything since Paradise Road, alas.
Thanks, IO. (Still skeptical, though.)
“In regards to other Aussie flicks on trains – if Noise is ever released do yourself a big favour and see it. There’s only one scene on a train, but it’s a doozy.”
“Noise” is out on DVD here in the states Kam, and I just saw a copy of it on the shelf at Blockbuster a couple of hours ago. It’s one of those “I really ought to be renting that” movies on my list. I’ll give it a go next time in tribute to your tip.
“Mike Tyson is to The Hangover as McDonald’s was to Super Size Me.”
Well, both of them did some harm to guys with questionable facial hair choices, so…true?