April 26, 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
Seriously, put a picture of a movie up there man! Come on! ANY MOVIE! Whatever it is, it will be better than that big ass goofy picture. Work with me brother. WORK WITH ME!
That aside, what the heck is out this week? Paranormal Activity 2. Yay. Time to go and see Never Let Me Go finally.
Oh yeah, Mad Men season four better than any movie released this year. MEGHAN DRAPER POWER!
A movie is not a TV series.
will Shia Labeouf do Transformers 4 ?
will RDJ do Iron Man 4 ?
how far ahead do movie studios figure this stuff out ?
cause they really need to keep the comic con fans happy..
Green Hornet doesn’t seem to be as well known as
other comic properties …what if it only does 25 million ?
Christian, that’s just a ridiculous response. Seriously, I have seen some great films this year but not a one of them touches LOST or MAD MEN and that’s the fact jack.
Christian is one of those MOVIES ONLY guys. I know a lot of them. Movie completism is its own form of Asperger’s. For years and YEARS I had it, all snobbish and condescending about television because I was a MOVIE GUY. But that attitude makes about as much sense as ignoring sports or politics or music to fixate exclusively on cinema.
Now that I think of it, half the “film geeks” I know in LA make this BIG PRODUCTION about how they DON’T HAVE CABLE, like that’s some BADGE OF HONOR. Congrats on being just another WHITE GUY OVER 30 WHO’S OUT OF THE POP CULTURAL LOOP.
RE: BOX OFFICE, a question for expert Poland, and this I’m genuinely curious about:
Paramount seems to release about eight movies a year, tops… or at the very least far, far fewer than any other studio.
What’s the thinking in releasing two, JACKASS and PARANORMAL, a week apart, where the latter is only going to cut into the former’s bounty? Seriously, Paramount puts out almost NOTHING all year, then couldn’t space these two out?
Lex it’s like that way in NYC too. I work with hipsters who constantly brag about not having a TV or cable. They go out of their way to work it into conversations.
Lex already mentioned this, but does anyone else think Zach G. is a deluded, self-absorbed asshole for objecting to Mad Mel’s Hangover 2 cameo? Apparently Zach has turned down several roles for “moral reasons” and pitched a fit about Gibson but had no qualms whatsoever about a wife-beating, convicted rapist being in The Hangover.
I was totally one of those movie only guys. Had rabbit ears until four years ago, and am currently planning to ditch cable for Roku and Hulu streaming. But I do acknowledge that HBO, AMC, Showtime and FX have elevated what is possible in television and made watching some series as enjoyable as movies.
But television and movies are different animals, with different strengths and limitations. I don’t think comparing the two gets us anywhere. That said, Mad Men had its best season yet, just awe inspiring good.
Yep. No cable for nearly 15 years. A few splashes of network. But now, nothing. I’ll occasionally try watching an episode of something I read about on Netflix or hulu — only to find it’s really not very good (just like most movies).
So this $115 million that Disney paid Paramount to release the worldwide rights to the Avengers, this has to mean Paramount would have had distribution rights to any sequels as well right? Disney isn’t just tacking on $115 to the budget of an already expensive movie?
And Mutiny, I can’t speak for other series but Mad Men is fantastic out of the gate, you should get hooked on it immediatly. Certainly worth the rental or even a blind purchase. The problem I have with most TV series is they never seem to go anywhere. 24 seemed like a big budget action film, filled with 21 and a half hours of padding and commercials. But Mad Men keeps its forward momentum, the charecters evolve, and there is no wasted time. The whole narrative is very economical, even though its only 13 episodes a season I think more happens than in a regular shows 22.
Yeah, AMC’s series pretty much destroy most films these days. Of course movies don’t have 13 hours for character development, but even individual episodes of BREAKING BAD, MAD MEN, etc just kick incredible ass. I can’t wait for THE WALKING DEAD.
The only thing movies can still trump TV with is gargantuan scale of action.
There are great series like the ones you listed but AMC’s forty hours of original programing a year is like a eclair floating in a sea of shit. Television on a whole is Dancing with the Stars, repetitive sitcoms, and ugly voyeristic chronicles of human misery (Intervention, Hoarders). These are what people watch. For all the accolades that Mad Men and Breaking Bad have recieved they still get their ass handed to them by the Kardashians each week. Movies on a whole still deliver more.
I don’t have cable simply because I don’t make much money, and it’s one less bill. And since I can fill that time with both working an extra job and seeing movies, it’s no massive loss.
If I get rich, I will have cable again.
It’s ridiculous when people compare a long running serial to a self-contained story.
Spoken by the dude who hates Kurosawa, Monty Python (uh, tv btw) and thinks Kid Rock RULES. And loves Tom Leykis.
That’s as bad as people who think every tv show they’re hooked on is the greatest blank in the history of blank.
Cut to Donald Sutherland raising his finger at you…
“… ignoring sports or politics or music to fixate exclusively on cinema.”
I do ignore sports and have stagnated on music (though I think Teenage Dream should be our new National Anthem). But it’s weird that you put politics in there as an entertainment choice.
“Hey, have you registered to vote?”
“No, but I do listen to a LOT of new bands.”
If it weren’t for live sports, I’d probably ditch satellite and just get my fix digitally. Why pay for all the crap you don’t watch?
I am trying to convince my wife to cancel cable and get a Roku or similar device. Together we watch 30 Rock, Parks & Recreation, Mad Men and Boardwalk Empire. I also watch Justified and Dexter. She watches a few reality shows. And really that’s about it. The monthly cable bill is way, way too high for 6 shows a year.
Netflix Streaming baby.
My other problem with Cable is that I can’t look away. Step Brothers plays every night on one of the Starz channels and I always end up watching half of it. Need to go to Sleep? ah what’s another half hour? Have three Netflix discs waiting to be watched? But it’s the Fucking Catalina Wine Mixer! Since we’ve gotten Starz I must have dropped 30-40 hours flipping helplessly between Step Brothers and Josie and the Pussycats.
Christian, the finale of Mad Men better than damn near anything I saw this year. The Mad Men episode THE SUITCASE better than almost every movie I have seen this year. The same goes with the LOST finale. You being you, you seem to think that the amount of time has something to do with quality storytelling, when it does not. Film, rarely comes close to touching a truly great TV show these days. If a TV show is truly great, truly transformative, a movie does not stand a chance and it’s not because of running time, it’s because those TV shows are usually better written, acted, and directed.
Also, if you don’t have cable. You are out of the loop. If you want to stream then guess what? YOU STILL HAVE FREAKING CABLE because you are getting broadband from cable providers. So it’s sort of, how do I put it, rightfully fucking ignorant, to have one without the other.
Sure, it could be expensive but you folks seem to not be referring to expense as much as you are discussing being woefully ignorant to society around you by thinking streaming and the internet are enough alone, when right now they are not. YMMV and all that jazz but if you have broadband, get basic cable because I am sure the package will be cheaper that way!
Is that the badass Sutherland of M*A*S*H and Animal House, or the silver-hair-villain-paycheck Sutherland?…
I seriously doubt that Galifianakis had enough power in “Hangover 1” to kick up a fuss about Tyson. It’s that movie that gave him the power to do it now.
Gibson is a nut. I doubt the Hangover 2 needed his taint all over that flick. Liam Neeson on the other hand, is a dude people love and when he cuts loose, it’s pretty awesome.
IO – all that was great in the episodes you have mentioned was because they laid the groundwork during the series in the years before. They don’t have to establish Don and Peggy in The Suitcase so they are able to get to the meat of the episode immediatly, a movie doesn’t have that luxury. The fact that Peggy had a kid she gave up is never mentioned but one of the interesting parts of that episode is the look on her face when Don said he never knew his mother. That is the advantage that TV has above film, being able to build week upon week. And the failure of TV is that most shows do nothing of the sort. Unless its a sequel, we start each film cold. If you saw Tomorrowland with no frame of reference of the previous four years you would not get the significance of Kenny being unwilling to chase down his family for business connections, the pregnancy, or even the secretary’s reaction to the spilt milkshake.
As for better written, directed, acted etc… I completly disagree with you. Even your beloved Lost was still TV level acting. Probably good for TV but still not movie level. You think people choose to be on television? They are either hoping to breakthrough to movies, or taking a gig for steady work in between supporting movie roles and low paying indie leads.
How are you ignorant of society if you don’t have cable? I have cable but only watch a handful of shows. I could stream the same handful. What would the difference be?
The Suitcase is definitely one of the best single episodes of television I have ever seen. As for the entire season, still not sure if it’s my favorite. Still digesting.
I don’t know that it’s ignorant of society, but I have noticed, anecdotally, that when friends and family have shut off the cable, they go pretty out of the loop in terms of pop culture references. Probably doesn’t affect many people’s lives in a really meaningful or important way, but the no-cable folks never really understand SNL skits or pop-cult references in comedy, standup routines, sitcoms. Once you pull the plug on cable, it’s a slippery slope to becoming the OLD GUY WHO DOESN’T KNOW ABOUT NEW MUSIC, who’s all “Huh? WHO?” at the Snooki references that infuse every late-night monologue, who doesn’t keep up with new TV personalities and water-cooler buzz stuff like Mad Men or Breaking Bad or Lost or Terriers or whatever.
Yes, you CAN stream anything, but when people can CHOOSE, they end up only seeing the stuff they have a natural inclination toward. All my life I’ve found cable fascinating in that you can flip through channels and land on something you’d otherwise have NEVER actively seeked out, and just through a general cable-osmosis, you tend to know more about music and personalities and movies and, yes, even THE NEWS than if you just dialed up CNN.COM for the headlines.
Plus, as someone hinted at up above with the STEP BROTHERS thing– I never enjoy a movie more than when I happen up on it, 2am, in progress, on Cinemax or HBO. The act of going to the shelf, putting in a DVD, squinting through the letterboxed presentation from 20 feet away on a sofa– No matter how pristine the visual presentation, it’s an active act of forcing yourself down to watch something you could stop at anytime. I’ve always much preferred just happening upon something and getting caught up in it ’cause it’s on live, in that moment, and you weren’t expecting it.
As for the pop culture references, you are close to right about that (though even with cable I have never seen an episode of Jersey Shore and still know who Snooki is, unfortunatly). The answer is to also stop watching late night monologues, stand up routines, and sitcoms as well.
But I have cable Lex and never see any of that stuff. I read about the stuff you mention (Snooky, SNL skits, etc.) as opposed to seeing it.
Also, midway between IO and LYT’s points:
I’m really broke and COULD stand to lose an extra bill I can’t afford… but how do you get good Internet without cable?
Plus without cable I wouldn’t be able to suffer through the current incredibly boring and protracted current season of SONS OF ANARCHY.
And how do you watch Kenny Powers?
Poland oughta change the name of this piece to THE SCALDING HOT BLOG, way I’m making it pop off the last couple days.
Anyone wondering why I’m amping up the crazy all over the web the last week or two: I’m about to get evicted because my job isn’t pay so well lately, so I need a WINDFALL, elsewise I have to leave L.A.
So this is my HAIL MARY attempt to get something, anything, to ring out.
Hcat, sorry, but your response about TV is just antiquated. Seriously, it’s the idea from another time when TV was below film and guess what? IT’s not. The Walking Dead in all of it’s six episodes will probably be better than any horrour film released this year. LOST remains better than most films and if you think Michael Emerson or Terry O’Quinn are just TV LEVEL ACTORS, then you sir are whistling dixie. Seriously, get current with your ideas about pop culture, maybe watch more cable?
Paul that’s the point: if you are not seeing it first hand then you are out of the loop now. It’s a super fast moving society and unless you see it and then tweet it. You get thrown out of the loop.
Again, do what you folks want and you make very valid points except you ignore that broadband is provided by people who will offer you cable for cheap, if you want to get rid of it, and that’s just the reality of the situation.
But why would I care about being in the loop on Jersey Shore? Life’s too short. Having cable doesn’t make me any more in the loop on stuff like that.
LEX – sucks about the job and all, but when I left LA it was the best decision I ever made in my life. So many people I know just tough it out there, waiting, hoping, trying. And for what? It becomes an existential waiting for godot thing after a while. You’d be happier anywhere else.
L.A. is the greatest city on planet earth, and FAMOUS PEOPLE live here, plus there are PALM TREES and SUN.
Plus not like I’m gonna be plowing through vag if I move to BUFFALO or something, what with all that overcast depressing weather. Plus guys are in shape everywhere now, so my doughy physique ain’t gonna go over any better in Canton Ohio than it does in Toluca Lake.
At least here’s there’s a ONE IN A ZILLION CHANCE of making it big… What am I gonna do in Ohio, open a bookstore and date some “nice girl”?
Fuck Ohio and fuck nice girls.
But I appreciated and understand the sentiment. Another two years like this though, and I might move to Tokyo and become a drug dealer.
The Green Hornet stars Seth Rogen & Cameron Diaz.
How many other comic-book movies have had the female love interest played by an actress older than the male protagonist?
I think you have to go back to Kidder & Reeve in Superman.
The pod person from INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS!
In Titanic, Leo was 16 and Winslet was 38.
I have a life of limited hours that requires living – cable is a time sucker as everybody who has like you can attest. Netflix Streaming and Delivery shall suffice.
IO, come on, stop acting that your perceived majority rules. It’s your worst trait along with screaming at folks for not liking what you do.
One word: AVATAR.
SOMEONE GET ME SOME PUSSY.
NOW.
Hcat – Avengers was positioned as a contractually obligated sequel for RDJ and most others from IM like Jackson and Scarlett. I tend to believe that’s why they introduced War Machine, because a day is coming very soon where RDJ will be too expensive for an Avengers sequel.
First “For Colored Girls” review: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/colored-girls-film-review-32056
I saw HEREAFTER today and was really pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it. Just a really great film that sort of teeters the line between schmaltz and heartfelt emotion but Eastwood keeps it in check. I really had little desire to see it but wanted to see a movie on a rainy day and I’m glad I did. Great stuff.
I really, really, really hope the Texas Rangers thump the New York Yankees tonight.
Me too. Sick of hearing my neighbors screaming.
“Yes, you CAN stream anything, but when people can CHOOSE, they end up only seeing the stuff they have a natural inclination toward. All my life I’ve found cable fascinating in that you can flip through channels and land on something you’d otherwise have NEVER actively seeked out, and just through a general cable-osmosis, you tend to know more about music and personalities and movies and, yes, even THE NEWS than if you just dialed up CNN.COM for the headlines.”
Bingo. That’s exactly why I just can’t pull the trigger and kill my Comcast like the mangy gouging runt it is. I think people underestimate how much of what they love wasn’t chosen so much as it was an accident of opportunity. So much of what I watch on TV is just happenstance gone right. And somehow putting a DVD of a show into the player or going to the Netflix website or whatever to stream something really can’t come close to the freeform flexibility of absent-minded channel surfing.
I also like to see something special while it’s happening now, not months from now (or even days).
Hallick: Funnily enough, this is fairly similar to what I think of as the unmatched value of newspapers — the happenstance factor. While paging through a newspaper, you can fortuitously come across something of interest.
After the Yankees get a run on a disputed call, the Rangers score 2. Apparently, there is a God.
GREEN HORNET’s not really a comic book property; radio show, then movies, then TV. Fans of the Hornet are already turned off by Rogen’s self-professed intent to “fuck around with it”–i.e., turn it into another brain-dead explosion comedy–so they better HOPE no one else knows the original very well…
Amen, brother.
Wow. That previous post was just dicky. Here’s the point Christian: I like what I like and will defend it. You fail to see the defense as a defense and what I have to do to convince you of my intent is beyond me.
You bringing up Avatar also ignores that I WAS NOT ALONE in believing it to be on it’s way to fail. Seriously, I get more hunches right than wrong and you KNOW THIS but you just love giving me crap for some reason. Thanks. Thanks a lot.
Also, I am not sure if a Roku box is like a DVR or if there are DVR type boxes that store streams. If they are, then you can have everything work on your schedule. If not, then cable is useful for their DVRs alone. Not comcast of course because they have shit storage capacity but my Uverse DVR is freaking awesome, and it would be hard to watch what I wanted when I wanted with out it.
Remember the words of Mr. Randy: “I CONTROL THE TV! THE TV DOES NOT CONTROL ME!”
Controversial post from one of the few student posters who admits to downloading TV content frequently (mostly the shows which have already been mentioned).
I would suggest the same tactic for Luke, who obviously wouldn’t be able to admit it if he did, although he would certainly benefit from it.
I know, I know, it’s immoral. Whatever.
I would get cable if I had the cash.
Keep telling yourself that…That’s what THEY want to hear…
“if you are not seeing it first hand then you are out of the loop now. It’s a super fast moving society and unless you see it and then tweet it. You get thrown out of the loop.”
And then do you explode? Die slowly? Lose your loved ones? What really happens when you are THROWN OUT OF THE LOOP?
Watching JERSEY SHORE makes you LOOPY.
Do you think any of the blame for “HEREAFTER” bombing could be placed on that horrible/creepy big-head one-sheet, where Matt Damon is photoshopped to look like one of the kids from “Village of the Damned?” AWFUL marketing.
a_loco — you’re not entitled to anything. if you don’t have the cash, earn some more. if you can’t afford something, you don’t just steal it. “whatever” perfectly sums up Gen Y, or whatever today’s youth is called.
You SIR are OUT OF THE LOOP! That’s what teh kidz today DO and you better GET WITH IT or BE THROWN FROM THE LOOP!
Hey, this is fun!
EMMA STONE ON SNL
EMMA STONE ON SNL
EMMA STONE ON SNL
EMMA STONE ON SNL
EMMA STONE ON SNL
YEP YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP.
Considering how liberal most people on this blog seem to be when we get political, it’s kind of surprising how strongly a lot of people feel about property rights.
In other words: Whatever, dude.
Loco, you know how I feel, but it’s your life. If this is what it takes to get you to see and listen to stuff, then go right ahead. Here’s hoping you make it up to the entertainment industry in the future XD!
“Do you think any of the blame for “HEREAFTER” bombing could be placed on that horrible/creepy big-head one-sheet, where Matt Damon is photoshopped to look like one of the kids from “Village of the Damned?” AWFUL marketing.”
A minute fraction maybe. But I think in some bizarre way, if someone’s not a movie junkie, a person might not make the connection between the freakish one-sheet they glance at in passing on the way to their theater and the advertisements that showed in the theater and on television because that poster’s radically different tone doesn’t resonate with anything I’ve seen of the film at all.
“Hallick: Funnily enough, this is fairly similar to what I think of as the unmatched value of newspapers — the happenstance factor. While paging through a newspaper, you can fortuitously come across something of interest.”
100% correct too. The same goes for magazines. The weird thing for me is how much of that experience the internet fails to reproduce despite its vastness. I’m 37, so maybe it’s a generational issue, but I rarely get hooked into something I find on the web like I’d get hooked into something I stumbled into in a back issue of a MacLeans magazine of all things.
Could we all just stipulate that the high horses people are saddling up over a_loco here are, at a generous best, Shetland ponies? Ten years ago I bought a bootleg VHS copy of “Made In Britain” and I am not ashamed, nor alone in my sin.
I have to admit, I buy a few bootleg DVDs every year or so — usually at a convenience store in Toronto — because I’m genuinely curious about what actually does get illegally duped, and what the dupes look like. For example: In September, I was shocked to see bootlegs of “That Evening Sun” for sale alongside “Inception” and all three of the “Millennium” movies. WTF? Don’t get me wrong: I loved “That Evening Sun.” But I didn’t really think of it as a movie that would appeal to people who buy illegal dupes. Of course, maybe there are lot more of those people, and they constitute a much wider demographic, than I’ve suspected.
Joe: The most interesting bootleg I’ve come across is DVD of The Great Dictator with its original Chinese poster art.
Finding that amongst all the new releases was very bizarre.
Well, I’m sure the law of supply and demand operates here. That is, someone made the bootleg because they thought there was a demand for it. A couple years ago, my wife ordered — from, by the way, a dealer who sold through Amazon.com — a boxed set of all episodes of the TV series “Providence.” Because she had not been able to find any similar boxed-sets offered elsewhere. (There has been, I think, only one legit, single-disc “Best Episodes” DVD package ever released for “Providence.”) When she got the DVDs, she discovered that (a) although the notes on the packaging were in English, the DVDs were manufactured in China, and (b) all the episodes had been recorded from reruns on the Lifetime network. Indeed, all episodes had the Lifetime watermark on the bottom of the screen, and a few actually still had commercials. And here’s the really crummy part: After she played a couple of the DVDs, her DVD player broke down.
I think the bombing of “Hereafter” also has to do with the lack of a star powered female lead. I thought Cécile De France was awesome (totalllllly didn’t realize she was the lead in “High Tension!”) but aside from the Bourne movies, I’m not sure Matt Damon can carry the box office.
I also just described the film in my review as what would have happened if M. Night Shyamalan had directed “Sleepless in Seattle.” They can’t really trailer the movie that way though so they were kinda stuck.
Mad Men can teach most of the films out there a thing or two about storytelling. It’s fucking beautiful.
You’ve seen every movie released this year? How do you find the time?
A story is a story is a story and TV is not getting a good rap here since so many of you are willing to just give it up. Nonetheless, Mad Men and the like are telling better stories and that’s the point you seem to be missing.