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David Poland

By David Poland poland@moviecitynews.com

The Informant!

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17 Responses to “The Informant!”

  1. Wrecktum says:

    The hell?

  2. jeffmcm says:

    Seeing this trailer helps me understand why Moneyball got shut down. Don’t get me wrong, this movie looks fantastic. But if Soderbergh was trying to make the same type movie, in a trickier genre, and on a higher budget, then yeah, I get why they cancelled it on him.

  3. Tofu says:

    I’m sensing the impression that not only is this a difficult film to cut for a trailer, but that the cutters were just as baffled as us.

  4. LexG says:

    Surely there’s a happy compromise between Kubrick/Malick “once every 11 years” perfectionism and Soderbergh “four movies in twelve months, eh it’s good enough let’s move on” scattershot prolificism.
    This looks to be sorely in need of Sasha Grey.
    Though kudos to Damon for growing the “Supercuts number three clipper cut” out 1/4 of an inch for this role. Christ, dude, GROW YOUR FUCKING HAIR OUT IF YOU STILL HAVE IT.
    Matt Damon’s hair is more boring than PBS.

  5. I really like the look of this. Reminds me of Burn After Reading in its comedic style.

  6. Stella's Boy says:

    I think it looks hilarious. I laughed out loud quite often. A much funnier trailer than the one for Couples Retreat. Great supporting cast too.

  7. don lewis (was PetalumaFilms) says:

    Funny how we were just talking about bad music cues in that other thread…Eurythmics? Really? Yikes.
    That does look fun though. They only thing I love more than shady, assholey, unlikable lead characters is total morons.

  8. I love it, if only for the somewhat off the beaten path casting choices. It’s been ages since Scott Bakula had a decent role, and it’s nice to see Thomas F. Wilson getting a supporting gig in a movie like this (I met him at a Back to the Future Q&A a few years back, he’s an awfully entertaining, warm, and funny guy). Best of all, Soderbergh has apparently cast voice-over legend Frank Welker (Dr. Claw, Abu, Megatron) in what I think is his first live-action acting job of his career (the man has 559 credits, and I’m pretty sure every other one is a voice over gig).

  9. DeafEars says:

    Huh, looks sort of like THE INSIDER played for laughs. I’m still on the fence in terms of actually seeing this, but it looks a lot less drippy than I thought it’d be. I do wish they didn’t have that exclamation point, because it makes me think of the worst title ever, LOVE! VALOUR! COMPASSION!

  10. marychan says:

    By the way, Sony’s Amy Pascal finally speaks out about ‘Moneyball’.
    http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/the_big_picture/2009/06/sonys-amy-pascal-speaks-out-about-moneyball.html
    Baded on the article, it looks like Amy Pascal made a very smart decision.

  11. christian says:

    Tom Wilson was great on FREAKS AND GEEKS.

  12. don lewis (was PetalumaFilms) says:

    I like the exclamation point, especially after seeing the trailer. It ties into how dumb and overly forthright the Matt Damon character is. As in: “I’m the INFORMER!”

  13. yancyskancy says:

    Scott: Tom Wilson is indeed about as engaging a guy as you could meet (I got to hang with him backstage a Sci-Fi convention back when I was a researcher for an animation company — I think he was there for Wing Commander — we were at the same table, and he regaled us with fun stories, none of which I remember).
    Christian: I agree he was wonderful in Freaks and Geeks. That character could’ve been a complete cliche, but Wilson and the F&G writers made him real.

  14. The Pope says:

    The thing that struck me most was Damon’s mustache. With his glasses and added woof to his hair, he looks like the connecting cousin of Geraldo Rivera and Paul Schrader.
    The Schrader glasses make him look smart, but the Geraldo mustache allows him to play the idiot.

  15. IOIOIOI says:

    I really do live for this type of film. Once the air grows cold, and my coat is removed from the hanger. Oh yeah… SCOTT MOTHERFUCKING BAKULA GETTING SOME LOVE! BOOYAKASHA!

  16. Josh Massey says:

    Can they go all two hours without a “message,” though?

  17. I’m like Elaine Benes, I can never have too many !s

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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