April 20, 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
Is there a way to search the DP/30’s?
I walked through Blockbuster today to see if stuff was out I’d forgotten about or missed. Sometimes I get surprised. Like I’d been waiting for Peep World to come out only to see it sitting there on DVD. When did that come out? A quick Comingsoon.net search shows a limited release on March 25. Really? How did I miss this?
And then the killer. I’ve adjusted to bigger and bigger names winding up in straight-to-DVD fare, but Bruce Willis? Didn’t think I’d see that day, and yet there’s Bruce Willis second-billed to Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson in The Set-Up. Ryan Philippe billed third. In fact, I think Philippe was on a couple other straight-to-DVD titles. The Bangbang Club with Taylor Kitsch was one.
The Bangbang Club is good, so is The Ledge and Mr. Nice … direct to dvd is the new drive-in
Krillian, yep, Peep World came out on like half a screen at the IFC Center in NYC on 3/25. Played for a week or so. Then played an indie house in Brooklyn. Then disappeared. Don’t know if it played L.A., too (assumed so but who knows).
Did you rent it? It’s really pretty bad. Review plug! http://bit.ly/dVJg0N
I saw that Willis was in that 50 Cent movie and assumed it’s some kind of second-billed-for-fifteen-minutes-of-screentime part. But it seems like a lot of actors that age (50+) are either going direct-to-DVD or coming perilously close. Remember no less than De Niro and Pacino were in a DTV-quality serial killer cop movie called RIGHTEOUS KILL? From the director of the even worse 88 MINUTES with Pacino?
I feel like part of it is that the best big directors working right now aren’t really fishing around for guys that age/prominence. It’s hard to picture De Niro or Pacino or even younger guys like Willis in like, movies by P.T. Anderson or the Coen Brothers or Wes Anderson (well, I could kinda see Willis in a Wes Anderson movie actually) or Aronofsky… they tend to go a little more obscure/character-actor-y for parts in that age range. David O. Russell, maybe.
Joe… they are not all on line anymore. Planning for that.
Google or YouTube or search here. Or ask.
D
I was actually looking for the LvT piece you mentioned or any other Melancholia related pieces.
Not sure if you were kidding or not but Bruce Willis actually is in the next Wes Anderson movie…
Huh, I guess I read that at some point but I wasn’t thinking about it when I wrote that. I guess that’s why it made sense to picture him in one!
Yeah, and PT Anderson’s entire thing is casting in that age range. Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia, and There Will Be Blood all have a guy in that age range in the lead or biggest supporting role.
Bruce Willis has gone direct to DVD before…that Ice Cream Suit movie or whatever. Maybe it played in a few theatres.
And of course overseas I bet The Set Up played theatres. Outside of America Seagal and Van Damme still get theatre treatment.
Assassination of a High School President never got a theatrical release did it?
Gus, that’s true, but when PTA goes that route, it’s rarely for someone as famous as Willis (unless DDL is in his age-range? I guess he is. But I feel like that’s a whole other world of casting if you’re considering DDL). I guess Liam Neeson sort of usurped some of those older guys by surprise, too.
Jesus that Christian movie Courageous might hit double-digits this weekend (boxofficeguru says that yesterday it had the top advanced ticket sales on Fandango if that means anything). I can’t wait for another round of stories about Hollywood and faith-based audiences.
Courageous is (I think) a lock for double digits this weekend. Fireproof did 6.7 opening weekend on 837 screens and a LOT less awareness from the church/director. Since then, Fireproof did over $30M domestic, who knows how much on DVD, and spawned several top-selling books. The awareness is there this time, and they’re dropping on 1100 screens.
Looks to me like it’ll push up on $50M domestic before it’s through.
And no, Assassination did not get a theatrical. It was bought for one but happened to end up shelved after Yari found itself in money troubles.
Yeah, DDL is two years younger than Bruce Willis.
It does seem weird that DDL and Willis are in the same age bracket, perhaps because Lewis works so infrequently it doesn’t seem that he has been around as long but Beautiful Launderette came out before Moonlighting premeried so he has actually been around longer.
Also seems odd to me that I once had trouble distinguishing between DDL and Gary Oldman. They were both English and came up at the same time, and mostly disappeared into their roles. It wasn’t until they both sort of made it big in 92 that I could really remember who was in which film (and at the time I preferred Oldman after Sid and Nancy, State of Grace and Rosencratz and Guildenstern). Now Oldman seems at least a decade older.
What do we think about IDES OF MARCH next week? Does it do the usual Clooney Opening 11 then fast-fade? I HAVE to think Gosling helps, big-time, after CSL and DRIVE, but it looks like such a medicine movie, I can also see it doing ALL THE KING’S MEN numbers.
Plus everyone who’s anyone is gonna wanna FACE THE STEEL next weekend, so IDES is Option B for me and everybody else.
IDES doesn’t look as compelling to me as GOOD NIGHT, AND GOOD LUCK, but I’m interested. Not sure Gosling will help much at the b.o. – DRIVE hasn’t exactly been a barn-burner, and CSL (sorry – C,S,L.) had Carell and Stone, who are probably bigger draws. The political subject matter isn’t exactly catnip to audiences either. I’m thinking the 11-and-fade scenario is a good bet.
The Ides of March has a great cast and looks like a solid film, but are people really going to want to pay to see it in theaters when they can get the real thing for free 24/7 on TV? I can’t imagine that many people are clamoring for a behind-the-scenes political tale at the moment. If anything they probably want a break from it.
I think Ides is a fantastic candidate for the Clooney 11, although I don’t know if his movies even fade that fast so much as play out with an average modern multiplier (in the 2.5 to 3 range) when they SEEM like they should be one of those movies that breaks out and gets to 60 or 70 off a soft opening, thanks to old people.
But with all of those name-ish actors led by Clooney and Gosling, and the overall pedigree, and the lack of tasteful grown-up movies in the past few weeks, I feel like this can definitely do the $12 million opening/$38 million gross, at least, that we’re accustomed to from almost any movie starring Clooney or Matt Damon.
With all of the fuss over Larry Crowne’s poor performance this summer — which did surprise me, as the old-people crowd I saw it with seemed to really like it — I think people were overlooking that, hey, it pretty much performed like an earnest Clooney or Damon drama. That’s about where a non-superhero-y actor with a lot of recognition and generally acknowledged class like Hanks is hanging out, these days. Opening to 12, topping out under 40, unless there’s some other marketable element.
Can we all stop and think about how weird it is that Clooney doing a pretty commercial, hugely well-reviewed, not-too-elliptical (that is, not The American) movie like Michael Clayton couldn’t top FIFTY million, and that was four years ago? That always shocked me. Up in the Air basically had the success I expected from that movie a couple years later, but still. Doesn’t it seem like in the late nineties, MICHAEL CLAYTON would’ve made 75 easy? Or would it have needed to star Richard Gere?
I had to look it up because I was certain that Michael Clayton did more than $50 million, but damn, you’re right, $49 million. And it is so much better than the insanely overrated Up in the Air.
Certainly there’s an audience for Ides of March, but I don’t think it’s a big one. Older viewers don’t rush out opening weekend, so that works against it. And I just don’t think too many people are eager to see a political drama right now.
The Ides of March marketing isn’t doing a lot to sell me on the movie. The commercials are vague. Ryan Gosling is some political campaign wunderkind… Clooney is the candidate. Phillip Seymour Hoffman has some cryptic line wedged into a hundred cuts.
I only have a fraction of an idea what the movie is about.
Very uninspired commercials.
IDES looks incredibly appealing to me, although I tend to enjoy this type of film. It’s defintely my number one choice for that week, although I’m sure I’ll see REAL STEEL too. Between Clooney as the director and that cast, I really don’t see how it’s not a must see. The trailer, which I think is relatively clear (Gosling is a campaign managing prodigy whose job is about to get a lot messier and whose values are going to be questioned…), gets a good response in front of the audiences I’ve seen it in front of.
Its only competition for adults will be MONEYBALL and CONTAGION. I don’t think older audiences are going to be particulrly excited about REAL STEEL, although I could be wrong. I would wager it does closer to MICHAEL CLAYTON/SYRIANA numbers than THE AMERICAN.
EDITED: Just remembered (the wonderful) 50/50 will also be out. I think adult audiences will REALLY like that movie.
Ides of March might be a must see for movie buffs, but what about everyone else? Are general audiences eager to see a movie about political shenanigans when they can just turn on CNN/FNC/MSNBC? Why pay for what you can get for free all day and all night?
Political movies don’t have a stellar box office track record. GNAGL, $31 million. All the King’s Men, $7 million. The Contender, $17 million. Frost/Nixon, $18 million. Lions for Lambs, $15 million. Bobby, $11 million.
I think with a movie like IDES the pedigree of whose involved, as well as the reviews, are a large selling point, moreso than the subject matter. It may not be with other types of films (or audiences not interested in these movies for that matter), but I think for more serious works, it is.
There was pretty significant pedigree in front of and behind the camera in the above political movies, and some received stellar reviews. Didn’t seem to help much.
I did forget about Moneyball and Contagion in terms of sapping some adult audiences (for some reason all I could think of were this weekend’s releases which seem to skew younger). That 40-50something audience seems like it’s actually been pretty well-served this month, actually. My mistake.
But yeah, even so, I don’t know if audiences really see those Ides of March ads and think “I could get that for free by watching the news!”… a lot of pundits or whoever say that about a lot of movies (why would audiences go when they could get the same thing for free by watching sitcoms/dramas/cop shows/the news/the internet?) but I don’t know that it’s an actual deciding factor for a lot of movies. The easy answer is: in the movie, it’s George Clooney and Ryan Gosling and Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Marisa Tomei doing it. Not unappealing real-life people. I mean, just about anything in a movie has something related that you could watch for free (or “free,” or for something you’re already paying for like cable or Netflix or whatever).
GNAGL did quite well for something that wasn’t a wide release out of the box; was in B&W; had fewer names; and was a period piece. A lot of those movies didn’t actually get wide releases, so I’m not sure if they’re fair comparisons.
Lions for Lambs, OK, maybe that’s a better one, and scarier for Clooney, because it’s stagy (I don’t know if Lions is actually based on a play the way IDES is, but it sure felt like it) and bombed despite three big names. But that movie was pretty poorly reviewed. I do think Clooney has a certain brand to him in serious movies, even if it isn’t worth much more than $50 million.
It’s also got the field to itself going forward, despite those September adult movies. The rest of October looks super niche-y/genre-y.
10/14: The Big Year, a comedy with big names that Fox only seems to have really decided to move forward with releasing like, two weeks ago (Fox seems into that short-lead marketing, though, so maybe they’re onto something); The Thing and Footloose, pure youth plays.
10/21: The Three Musketeers, which I want to see because it looks ridiculous, but who is it for apart from weirdos like me? And Paranormal 3, which no one under 35 will see.
10/28: Johnny “why are they even releasing this theatrically in America?” English; In Time, which is obviously going after a youngish audience; The Rum Diary, which looks awesome but isn’t going to be embraced by the squares; and Anonymous, which, yeah, I don’t know, regardless of what Poland says, looks really dumb.
Even the typical Oscar-y movies that sometimes expand through October aren’t really there this year. So Ides could hang in there even if it gets a typically middling Clooney opening.
I think it depends on what you’re classifying as a “political movie”. Again, I don’t think the grosses of those movies have to do with their subject, per se. Quite a few of those were not-well received. Also, GNAGL has a great gross, considering how small that movie is.
If I broaden the definition a bit…
Syriana $50,The Good Shepherd $59,Green Zone $35,Primary Colors $39, W. $25, Charlie Wilson’s War $66, Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps $50, (Demme’s) Manchurian Canidate $66, State of Play $37
I’m not saying all these were hits (a few clearly aren’t) but that they are respectable grosses (removed from budgets) that these movies can have. As an A-list, all-star drama I think IDES with gross similarly to SYRIANA, WALL STREET 2, or CHARLIE WILSON’S WAR.
$31 million is fine for GNAGL. Would it be fine for The Ides of March?
I’m not suggesting that Ides has no mass appeal, or that all viewers are going to see TV spots and immediately think that it’s something they can see on cable news every night.
I’m wondering how much wide appeal it has. Based on their box office performance, general audiences don’t seem to be all that eager to see political movies. Some of those movies received great reviews and have had big stars in them. Didn’t matter.
There’s definitely an audience for serious dramas in October, but I don’t see Ides of March opening with more than $12 million. But I’m sure it wasn’t very expensive to make.
Good call on Assassination. Seems like Yari had a couple decent titles that had the same fate around that time. Breakfast of Champions made $178,000-ish.
Yeah, The Ides of March has a likeable pedigree but it looks like Gosling betrays Clooney halfway thru the movie when he learns of some horrible secret, and then maybe regrets his choice. Don’t know the story, that’s just what I’m getting from the trailer.
I think you’re broadening the definition way too much JKill. Ides of March is clearly a movie about a presidential campaign. It doesn’t seem to have a whole lot in common with The Manchurian Candidate remake or Syriana.
What will be most fun next weekend is when Ides of March indeed opens with the usual $11-13 million and all the reactionary pundits ONCE AGAIN ask “Is George Clooney still a movie star?!?!” and/or mock Clooney for his alleged box office failure, completely blind to the fact that nearly all of his adult dramas/comedies have opened to around $11-13 million since 1997.
I agree that the TV ads for Ides are not cutting the mustard. I watch these things and I really have no idea what the movie is about other than Clooney is a candidate and Gosling is an advisor. And there are some problems that come up. That’s all I get from them.
To me that’s the biggest sign of something underperforming – the ads are not directly asking the audience to have a specific experience. As a result I think Moneyball is a stronger choice for adults this weekend.
And I say this from the point of view of someone who loves Clooney, sees all his movies, etc. The American was definitely a top-5er for me last year.
Also, getting GNAGL numbers for Ides is not a win at all. That was a $7M movie in black and white.
Breakfast of Champions is the kind of disaster that makes me sad. Not mad, just sad. And believe it or not: It premiered at the Toronto Film Festival. As a gala, if I remember correctly.
http://www.movingpictureshow.com/archives/mpsBreakfastChampion.htm
Has anyone seen Blackthorn? I really like Sam Shepherd and it sounds really good.
No, PaulMD, $31 million would not be good for Ides (though it wouldn’t be a disaster). But my point was that GNAGL made that money without ever getting in more than 1,000 theaters; you were bringing it up as an example a weakly performing political movie showing that there’s not much interset in that type of movie. But Ides making $31 million wouldn’t really be emulating GNAGL. If it did about as well as GNAGL, accounting for its wider initial release, that would mean, I don’t know, opening to 11 or 12, and making 45-50. Which I could see happening… although, sure, it’s entirely possible that it will top off around 25 or 30. It just doesn’t seem unthinkable to me, given its light competition (third weekend of Moneyball? That’ll be, what, $8 million?) and high pedigree (and it looks a bit more like a thriller than GNAGL).
I remember sort of not quite liking Breakfast of Champions, but admiring that it wanted to be pretty faithful to a wonderful but nigh-unfilmable novel. A nice try, I’d call it (but more in the Terry Gilliam realm of nice try). Which reminds me that Slapstick apparently was made into a movie of sorts? I remember Rabin covering it for My Year of Flops. I just finished the novel for the first time… excellent book but I cannot imagine anyone thinking that would work as a movie.
PaulMD, yeah I was stretching the term but I think broadly they’re applicable as A-list movies with some kind of political subject matter. There really aren’t that many campaign movies made, so I thought I would enlarge the sampling size.
Jesse, to back up what you’re saying further, IDES has almost an entire month with the adult/upscale audience to itself. Until J. EDGAR opens in November, it doesn’t have any wide release direct competition from new openers. (Unless the Emmerich movie is not what I would assume it to be. Has anyone seen the little press kit video for that, that plays before movies at AMC? It’s amusing everytime.)
I didn’t mention GNAGL’s $31 million to prove that it was a weak performer. I agree that that number is solid for the type of movie it is. I was listing the movies I feel are most relevant as points of comparison for The Ides of March, serious movies for adults about media, politics, or some of both. When I say that those movies don’t have a stellar track record at the box office, GNAGL would represent the stronger end of the spectrum. For the most part, those movies have not performed well. Maybe viewers are clamoring for a serious political drama with high pedigree this time of year, but as someone who has wanted to see it since it was first announced, the TV spots do nothing for me and I don’t see it breaking out.
The average box office of those movies in your expanded list? $47 million. Was a single one really considered a hit? I guess $47 million would be a decent final tally for Ides of March.
I guess technically, we aren’t way way apart on this. If Ides of March makes $45 million or so, it’ll be pretty much in line with other Clooney dramas, other pedigreed political dramas, other non-romantic mainstream Gosling movies… and that may not be enough to consider it a HIT, but it’s probably enough to justify the investment. I guess I’m just saying I think it’s more likely to crest 40 million than it is to really flop and come in under 25.
Yeah I don’t think we’re all that far apart. I just like talking box office. My wife tends to roll her eyes and leave the room when I try it at home.
“Has anyone seen the little press kit video for that, that plays before movies at AMC? It’s amusing everytime.”
HAHAHAHAHAHA YES. I used to always come kinda late to the movies knowing there’s a 10m window of trailers I’ve already seen on the Web, but for whatever reason I always seem to make it to AMC in time for the pre-show countdown with that lyric-less LA LA LA song *and* the highlight: The ANONYMOUS package, with Emmerich looking like a gay Fred Armisen and pontificating that “The more and more I read up on it, the more I’m convinced he did NOT write these plays.” I’m starting to Stockholm-enjoy it.
I’m so glad I’m not the only one who has witnessed the greatness of AMC’s ANONYMOUS press package! (Your description was dead on, and I cracked up.) I’m in the exact same boat that you are. I usually try to get in some time right before the trailers start because I don’t like waiting around while the commercials play and people shuffle in but, probably because of my movie going OCD, I usually arrive early. And yes, without fail there is Emmerich bestowing knowledge upon all us, the uneducated masses. I LOVE how we’re supposed to be motivated to see the movie because Emmerich, learned scholar that he is, has been hitting the books. I get this impression of him up at all hours with a cup of coffee, hunched over and flipping the pages of ancient manuscripts. Or him as a Jim Garrison-type obsessive, personally and slowly unraveling some unprecedented, vast conspiracy. I’m amazed every time but the audience seems to give it just polite, disinterested attention. Maybe GODZILLA would’ve done better if the trailer would’ve just been RE, in front of a bookshelf and a crackling fire, telling us that he is convinced that Godzilla would CERTAINLY destroy a major American city.
(I am actually looking forward to the movie, both because of DP’s praise from a week or so ago and because it looks insane.)
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA esp the Godzilla/crackling fire bit.
FWIW, also a big fan of the Stubs spot where the guy remembers taking his girlfriend to TITANIC (14 years ago? Even I’d say put a ring on it.) Always stoked when I get that one or the black guy taking his daughter to her first 3D movie, and not the family where “every year we always see ONE BIG MOVIE and get a GREAT BIG POPCORN.” Part-timers.
Ahhhhh you are both actually cracking me up at work describing the Emmerich piece, which I know I’ve seen but haven’t really paid much attention to. Will tonight at What’s My Number.
Lex, you know what I (stupidly) find impressive about those Stubs ads? The dates on the ticket stubs ARE ACCURATE. Like they went and put the actual release date of Titanic opening night on that stub. Even though, yeah, the narrator sounds like he’s about 18, even though clearly he would be by now, well, my age. But I do appreciate that they have the actual release dates there. Don’t ask me why.
I have to say: I was annoyed by the pay program, but (admittedly in part due to offering to buy people’s tickets fee-free ahead of time, and getting my wife’s tickets on the same card), I’ve gotten like $70 worth of AMC money from them in about six months. So, I have to admit, not bad.
Yeah, the TITANIC reference point is odd. I’m assuming they just wanted to use a movie they knew EVERYONE in the audience would’ve seen. (As opposed to like a first date to see GOSSIP or RINGMASTER.)
The family who only goes once a year, while I’m sure they exist, seems like something you would NOT want to support if you’re a major theater chain. Part-timers, indeed.
I actually broke down yesterday and finally got the AMC Stubs card because I thought I would eventually make a little money off of it. We shall see…
EDITED: Glad, it has worked for you Jesse. I too found the idea of paying for a loyalty card pretty crass but I’m there so much I eventually had to relent.
Seconded: The plan pays for itself pretty quickly if you go to a lot of movies (especially if you bring a friend or date and buy multiple tix)… I seem to get free stuff every few weeks. The only confusing thing is, guaranteed every time, is the teenage kids there never seem to QUITE know what you’re going for with the card (swiping for points vs payment), plus the sales spiel about it to EVERY CUSTOMER slows down the lines big-time. Like, hey, kiddo I’m late for CONTAGION, can you stop hard-selling the half-deaf 70-year-old Mexican guy on the Stubs plan?
They should do a STUBS commercial where a depressing 36-year-old guy remembers going to see THE GOODS by himself at the 10am matinee on opening day 8/12/09 and sat in row three, sixteen rows away from the one other (twitchy and scratchy) paying customer with a sneaked-in bottle of Mountain Dew.
“plus the sales spiel about it to EVERY CUSTOMER slows down the lines big-time.”
YES! I was cutting it close on my way to CONTAGION and an older woman in front of me buying tickets for THE LION KING 3-D was asked if she knew about the Stubs program. She answered that she did not. She was asked if she would like to. She took literally forty five seconds to decide that, yes, she would in fact like to. She listened attentively to the rather extensive sales-pitch, and then said, no thanks. There was a line that stretched outside the theater.
I was ENRAGED.
Lex, your Stubs commercial had me bust up in laughter. Bravo.
(THE GOODS is actually pretty funny.)
some people protesting wall street .. the banks and stuff ..
some pictures …
http://www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2011/09/occupy-wall-street/100159/
Yeah, they softened the blow for me a little by making the first year free (apparently I was “active” enough with my Moviewatcher card to warrant this), but I won’t mind too horribly paying $12 next year. It’s basically, buy one movie admission now, get five or six more later… but then, even with sometimes getting screenings, I still go a lot, like usually twice a weekend, sometimes more (not everything is at AMC, either, but in NYC you can see a pretty clear majority of stuff at one of theirs).
That’s funny, I’ve seen lots of tabling at NYC multiplexes for the card, but haven’t heard much sales-pitching in the lines… but then, I’m pretty much only in the lines if I’m redeeming Stubs points. Otherwise, the kiosks that, wow, at least 50% of customers seem unable to use, still. Makes it faster for me, but still, wow.
JKill: “The trailer, which I think is relatively clear (Gosling is a campaign managing prodigy whose job is about to get a lot messier and whose values are going to be questioned…), gets a good response in front of the audiences I’ve seen it in front of.”
What does this mean? Do they applaud, nod, make impressed grunts, shout “Hear, hear!”? Not ball-busting – just genuinely curious how one can tell that a drama trailer like this goes over with a crowd. At best in these situations, I might overhear someone near me whispering “Looks pretty good,” but I’ll admit I may not be terribly observant about this stuff.
That’s basically what I mean. I think a hushed, attentive interest followed by positive murmurs afterwards signals positive interest for that type of movie. I do like to try to read the room during them, for what that’s worth.
On the flip side, the laughs and negative murmurs following the CONAN ads (totally different type but still) showed that people weren’t that into what they were seeing. Obviously, in either case it’s totally subjective based on how I perceive it. But that’s what I’ve generally noticed. I think a quiet engrossment, for that type of trailer, speaks to something working.
I would love if I heard a “hear, hear!” but, so far, no dice.
I agree that it’s possible to know that people are paying attention to a trailer, which for a serious movie I think means interest.
I saw a matinee of Moneyball last week on a huge screen with great sound, and the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo teaser was shown. The ending rocked everyone because that bass kick is just so huge. Right when it ended and the “Coming” text came up on the screen, there was a moment of silence, then a guy in the back of the house just yelled WOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! And everyone laughed. I think we were all thinking the same thing.
TGWTDT teaser is my favorite in a good while. I love the buzz and energy that ripples through the theater. I am SO excited for that.
I was bummed Costner left but it’s aaawwwweeesssooommmeee that Kurt Russell is going to be back on another Tarantino with DJANGO. (It’s also awesome that both his choices have played Wyatt Earp…I’m sure that doesn’t mean anything but it’s kinda cool.)
I was also bummed about the Costner thing which surprised me since I have never been a fan, but yeah, RUSSELL.
Costner in a Tarantino movie really did sound like another ace bit of casting to me.
Are we all BASKING in the news on IndieWire that Charlie Kaufman’s new script/potential project is about a MOVIE BLOG COMMENTER who’s a blowhard/loser who’s managed to attain a small following solely from his movie blog rants. The article says the character “sounds like LexG of Hollywood Elsewhere,” though that is their opinion, not anything from Kaufman.
Still, I am apparently to be played by Leonardo DiCaprio.
Martin S, NEGOTIATE A WAY for me to get a cut of this, or at least a consulting gig on the movie… or an appearance on the DVD.
David,
Did you ever see this LA Weekly article by La Finke:
“Welcome to journalist-as-microphone substituting for journalist-as-skeptic….”
http://www.laweekly.com/2002-07-04/news/vanity-too-fair/
Checked out that Indie Wire article, Lex, but it looks like you’re either Nicolas Cage or Jack Black (the DiCaprio reference was to Django Unchained).
remember like years ago when the bestest actor ever was Daniel Day Lewis …and then he went away and none of major movie critics talk about him anymore ?
DP – now is your chance to get a dp/30 …just leave some milkshakes out in the front yard and grab him and make him do a dp/30 …
Yeah, Dan… that’s when I started writing about her vendetta-as-journalism grotesquerie.
People prefer to look the other way.
breaking tv news ..\
Arrested Development returning for one more season!
might be real…
its the only show even i understood with the crazy amount of plot lines they had