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
CHARMING. LOOK… AT… HER!
Also, smooth move on spoiling the whole movie, DP.
You mean by explaining something that isn’t in it?
I know that’s what you said in the last thread about this, but for those who have no idea what to expect (and I know nothing about Mulligan/Fassbender’s relationship in the movie), you’re making it sound (ie, to me) like there’s some wack twist where she’s his sister and they bang, or don’t bang… or something; I thought she was just some awesome chick he falls in love with… Since you keep bringing up “incest,” I’m assuming you’ve spoiled some Tyler Durden-scale MIND BENDER.
Nope.
Ah, well, that’s a relief.
The LOOK AT HER still stands. Man is she FETCHING. She is SO CHARMING, she is pretty much IDEAL. Is she one of the nicer people in showbiz? Everywhere I’ve ever seen her interviewed she seems really genuine… might be part of her “shtick,” probably is, but she is almost at Evan Rachel Wood levels of coolness to where I almost don’t wanna be lecherous about them because they just seem so smart and awesome and I’d actually be all respectful and wouldn’t go all the way lecherous.
It’s like she’s a Real Human Being.
Totally agree, but have to question her judgment just a little…two words…Shia Labeouf. Looking forward to seeing “Shame” at both the Variety Screening Series (11/8) and The Envelope Screening Series (11/10)…hope they have some good moderators for the Q&A of Carey!
I don’t think you’ll see Carey at either screening. She’ll be on her way back to Australia shortly to start Gatsby.
But Fassbender and McQueen aren’t a bad substitute.
I could imagine David so giddy after running to mommy and getting the goods on his pet thing on this one. “Ooh! Ooh! They’ll see!”
And yet — it doesn’t change the fact that the film is still open to interpretation.
Wow, Kris. Couldn’t you come up with anything more petty?
Kris is good at petty. If you’re good at something…
Tough room.
Not so tough if you don’t act like a petty little prick.
Seriously, Kris. “running to mommy” and “his pet thing”?
Are you a professional or a troll?
And be prepared to hear the conversation with McQueen and Fassbender too. I will spend a whole 2 minutes on it during those 30s as well… just as I did with Portman and Aronofsky and Hershey regarding the ending of Black Swan last year. And then you can interpret all you like.
Or perhaps you should make me a list of the questions you don’t want me to ask this season.
indiemarketer: Don’t be too hard on Carey for getting involved with Shia. I think it may be a law that actors who play love interests must become an item in real life (even if only for a night or two). I just read a bio of Glenn Ford, so this subject has been on my mind.
Don’t go changin’.
Shia seems to have a way with the ladies (and bar fights). Wasn’t he with Adrian Grenier’s girlfriend when he drunkenly crashed his car? He had a little fun with Megan Fox during Transformers filming. The chicks dig him.
Kris… you’ll never earn the smugness you portray. You’ll try for a long time and then grow up and laugh at your previous self.
Hint: If the best argument you have is to mock, you have no argument worth making.
I really don’t know what you’re talking about at this point. But my argument was made elsewhere. You can’t take a joke here. Blah, blah, blah.
Though you’re right. You’ve cornered the market on smug. Sorry to step on your turf.
Oh, and while I appreciate the preview of things to come, I have zero interest in your discussion with Fassbender and McQueen over this issue because, like here, it will be little more than, “I got into a fight trying to make people understand that this movie isn’t up for interpretation and that THIS is the thing, not THAT — are you with me???”
Had you been a little more worth the time it takes to click and engaged over the fact that it IS an interpretation so many are walking away with, and how could that not have been something discussed, and what do they think of that, etc. (and indeed, if McQueen shushed people asking those questions in Toronto, which you seem so giddy with Ms. Mulligan over here, then shame on him), rather than being so callously dismissive of that take (you don’t have it in you otherwise, unfortunately), then maybe it would be a different story.
As it is, I stand by what I wrote, however “prickish” it might have seemed to you. This reads less like an attempt to start a conversation and more like an attempt to stop one.
So…shame on you.
Kris… after the snotty first jab, you can’t get the high road back. Sorry.
So Kris, you claim that DP is shutting down a conversation and not appropriately acknowledging that a movie is open to interpretation? That’s pretty amusing. Just a few weeks ago you played the “you didn’t get it card” when I wrote that I had some serious issues with The Ides of March on HitFix. Does a lazier argument exist? Talk about something that doesn’t exactly invite further discussion. I was pretty stunned that you would accuse someone else of not getting Ides of March just because they didn’t like it as much as you did. It’s really quite asinine and something I’d expect from AICN talk-backers and their ilk. Shame on you.
The Hot Blog – where Hollywood professionals go to act like Middle Schoolers.
David: Truly hilarious. Like I said, don’t go changin’.
Paul: I took the time to go back and read my response. This is that response (to your assertion that The Ides of March was not “as smart as it thinks it is” and that it “repeats the obvious too much, that politics is dirty”):
“As smart as it thinks? Respectfully, yours is the classic, unfortunate, miss-the-boat reaction a lot of critics are coming away with. It doesn’t think it’s smart. It’s dead-faced, ‘this is how it is,’ not at all aiming to present epiphany.
“It’s staggering, to me, how many people are so hung up on the idea that they wanted it to be somehow revelatory of a game that has been dirty since the dawn of time.”
What is so objectionable? A lot of critics went after that film because they wanted something new about politics, when the film was less about politics than it was about human nature. These are arguments I consistently made in that thread and others. It was about looking for the wrong thing in the movie, wanting something to be there that wasn’t intended to be there in the first place.
This is a different issue entirely, about something being in the film, however vague, and warranting a reaction. And most of it stems from David’s dismissive reactions to people on the Twitter debate he brought up in the interview here. I think I was quite respectful in my response to you. You took it as “you didn’t get it,” as if I didn’t offer more than that. Silly.
Not that one is relevant to the other, but you brought it up, so there it is.
Yeah sorry Kris but saying that I had a miss-the-boat reaction reads to me like claiming that I didn’t get it. I don’t find that very respectful, but I guess it’s open to interpretation. If you hate DP so much, maybe you should find other places to post. I certainly make sure to avoid HitFix.
I don’t hate David.
OK hate might be a strong word. Looking over your comments here, it sure seems like you dislike him a lot.
I don’t think Kris hates me. But I do think he believes everything I do comes from some place of condescension and would like to take me down a few pegs.
The idea that someone with a decade more experience in the field might know something he doesn’t makes him absolutely crazy.
One can make the argument that they still think the movie means something other than what the actors and filmmakers think it means. I still adore Manohla Dargis’ AIDS metaphor take on Alien 3, though Fincher has dismissed it as false.
But when you need to go to “went to mommy,” it’s not anything but schoolyard bullshit.
Of course, this all started with a tweet by me, expressing how I felt about the film when I saw it, which was responded to angrily, as though I was putting someone down by feeling very clear on this issue.
I have spent a lot of time interpreting movies that other people “don’t get.” But I don’t argue that they are idiots not to see it my way. Of course, Kris thinks that I think everything I think is meant to be a monument and that I think anyone who disagrees is an idiot. Not the case.
I do think what I first tweeted… there is nothing in the text of Shame that points to incest. There is plenty that points to dysfunction. And if you feel compelled to assume that dysfunction includes incest, I can’t stop you. But just because the brother is a sex addict and considers his sister, at one point in the film, as a sexual object, does not the case for incest make.
This is my affirmative argument about the issue of whether incest is part of the movie, Kris. Not an attack on you. But you can never get that through your head. I don’t filter my ideas through your prism. When I repeatedly heard/read about incest in this film, I reacted to its absence. But I wasn’t there to make a point… to win some prize.
And now your position is that I bullied Carey into agreeing and will do the same with McQueen and Fassbender? Do you need to not be wrong so badly that you would insult all of them too?
And you know, if one of them disagrees with me, I won’t be crying either. I will be interested in their perspective. That’s my job… listening to others. Perhaps you should try it.
But then again, I was young once too. And no doubt, very much an asshole. Some might say that never changed. But if you want to see change, you have to open your eyes… just a little.
The incest conversation seemed even weirder as I first started hearing about it after seeing Mulligan on stage in ‘Through a Glass Darkly.’ Suddenly it was like she was only doing projects involving incest.
You charge by the hour, David?
I can give you a referral if you need one, Kris. But I don’t think you need one. You just need a job you respect.
But I do think he believes everything I do comes from some place of condescension and would like to take me down a few pegs.
You mean you can go lower?
Who’s being the prick now?
I was fine with your original comment. Until you edited it to be a little more personal and try to get a rise. Weird.
Incest, huh? I just saw a gay Brazilian film, “From Beginning to End” about 2 half brothers who become lovers. It follows the boys from birth to their 20’s. Damned if the director doesn’t find a way to actually feel for these guys, especially since they seem to have a supportive family (quel horror!). It really shakes one’s thinking about this taboo.
Should an incestuous gay relationship be subject to the same standards as a heterosexual one? It’s not like you have to worry about a gay couple having babies. The filmakers succeed in getting you on the boys’ side when you actually fear that one of the brothers’ adventures might endanger the relationship.
Wow, that sounds like an upper… VOTE PERRY IN ’12.
I’m still trying to figure out how Ides of March would ever be considered “smart”.
SPOILERS AHEAD
It’s a well acted morality play with every major moment telegraphed so far in advance the only people in the theater who won’t see them coming will be the ones who fell asleep due to the anemic pacing.
I even would say i liked it, but what in the movie was ‘smart’. The plot about a politician who can’t keep his dick in his pants? The young guy willing to compromise his integrity to win? Because it was about politics?
I liked the acting in Ides of March, but that movie was about as ‘smart’ as any other run of the mill political thriller, i.e. not very.
Agreed anghus. And that’s why I deemed it not as smart as it thinks it is. Poor choice of words maybe, but that’s how I felt after I saw it. It struck me as one of those “serious adult” movies that fancies itself wise and incisive but really isn’t all that complex or deep.
My own random interpretation was not incest, but that the two siblings grew up in an abusive household, and therefore they had a sort odd interaction at times. The relationship reminded me of people I knew who grew up in volatile homes and sort of clung to each other or acted in strange ways. Maybe they slept in each other’s beds for comfort or seemed to have a provocative stance that would make other people feel…uncomfortable.
I often remember sleepovers when I was a kid in a house I could never sleep in… the vibe was just not one that made me comfortable. It wasn’t incestuous or crazy nudity, though the bathroom door never seem to shut fully. But there was something too loose… something too unstable… still not sure exactly what it was…
Even in my own family, in which there isn’t any of that extreme behavior (that I know of), each of my siblings have a different comfort zone with how their immediate family interacts. If no one is being hurt, it’s not really something I feel I should judge at all.
Really, the Avalon “you cut the turkey” scene is right in this mode. For that sibling, cutting the turkey was a profound personal affront. And for him, it was real, even if the audience laughed.
You can figure out how I feel about the Ides of March by the two people who seemingly didn’t like it, get it, or whatever those two do.
I liked The Ides of March, just didn’t love it. Great performances. I’d give it a B.
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