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
Lincoln has very good “weekend arcs”. Which is why it will likely be #2 for the weekend. Really though it has so much fewer screens that comparing the two doesn’t make sense.
Guardians is holding on for dear life isn’t it. It’s still a disappointment domestically, but initially it looked like it wouldn’t clear $75m, but it will surely get past $85 when Christmas is all tucked away. It will be interesting to see if Monsters Inc has any impact on it.
Seems also the public response will drown out the critical response for The Hobbit. Audiences seem to be lapping it up while critics nitpick the hell out of it. That’s their job I guess.
When discussing The Hobbit’s trajectory however, let’s not forget those remarkable December legs. Of the top ten December openings, only two, I Am Legend and Sherlock Holmes 1, failed to gross more than 4 times their opening weekend number. And all of the LotR’s grossed more than 5 times their opening weekend number. So with a $100m or near to it opening, we could be looking at a $400m gross when all the dwarves are counted.
Each LotR could have theoretically had a bigger opening weekend if they did not open on Wednesday, so we’ll see how that evens out in the days to come, but all told it’s a phenomenal number.
What are the Weinsteins doing with Silver Linings Playbook? I think they are really missing an opportunity to get out in front of “This is 40” as the go to adult comedy. Whatever base level word of mouth that is needed to facilitate a decent opening and legs on 2,000 screens is either out there or not by now. The film is beginning to drop off and I don’t think Oscar nominations are really going to be a game changer for a movie like this.
Personally, I’m not a fan, but the twenty year old girls who were tearing up in the last ten minutes were not swayed by critics awards and all that jazz in to seeing the movie. The Weinsteins have a chance at a big mainstream Eloi hit here and I think they’re botching it.
Dave, hope you keep the reviews coming on some of the big holiday stuff. Curious what you think of the 48 fps too. Seems like most critics are hating it.
It really pays to launch a big ass blockbuster the week before the holiday craziness. Hobbit will be at, what, $250m at least by New Years day?
I’m also a little confused by the roll out with Silver Linings Playbook. Last week seemed like a natural choice to go wider, but I figured they were waiting for the Golden Globes nominations. But now what? Did not expect them to slow walk this one Artist-style.
I still think SLP’s a contender, and it’s certainly not thrown to the wolves like TWC did with Killing Them Softly… But since it’s not really catching fire, getting the sense that Weinsteins are throwing all their weight behind DJANGO instead as “the one.”
Yea, they really effed up “Killing Them Softly.” I’m not saying it was ever going to be a huge hit, but there’s at least 30m out there if you cut a trailer highlighting the action beats and Pitt as the star. Call it the “Drive 30” or whatever you want. “Lawless” which I didn’t see and could be more commercial than I’m giving it credit for did what TWC could have done with “Killing Them Softly.”
Maybe, but that Cinemascore F is pretty damning. And that’s almost always from mismarketing, people expecting “The Departed” or whatever, and that’s just based on the existing trailer, which I thought was fairly representative of the film. The hip-hop music’d TV spots were another story.
Honestly, I didn’t think KTS was THAT avant-garde or off-kilter, wasn’t like it was “Tree of Life” where “regular” people had no context for what it is. I thought it was a fairly straightforward, edgy gangster movie with a couple arty touches, but nothing MYSTIFYING. But anecdotally, the few people I know who took the plunge, it was like they got suckered into watching the 8-hour Andy Warhol EMPIRE STATE BUILDING movie. So, who knows.
900th person to ask this I’m sure, but were the fears really justified that NOBODY wanted to open last week except the Butler romcom, and nothing big went counterprogramming yesterday?
Honestly, is PARENTAL GUIDANCE or THIS IS 40 gonna make so much more opening against Django, Les Mis, Reacher, Guilt Trip, etc, than they would have made last week?
Why didn’t PROMISED LAND just open wide on the 7th last week? Just seems like an ego thing, everyone wanting to pack in 20 movies between the 19th and 28th, and in the end only four or five will really catch on. I know Uni and Apatow have probably deluded themselves that THIS IS 40 is some big holiday event, but I can’t imagine anything less suited than a cynical “aging sucks, couple drifting apart” movie on Christmas day.
I’m sure Poland has pie charts on why they choose certain dates, but THIS IS 40 could’ve made 15 or 20 last weekend and maybe 7 or 8 this weekend.
Instead, it’s gonna open at like number 9 in a week and be lucky to hit 20 total domestic.
As exasperating as it’s been to watch, Weinstein’s torturously slow roll-out of “SLP” isn’t all that different from how F-S handled “The Descendants” a year ago.
And, much to my surprise, that actually seemed to work.
Since “SLP” is, arguably, even more accessible and audience-friendly than the Payne/Clooney film, I see no reason why lightning can’t strike twice.
But maybe I’m just being cautiously optimistic because I love “SLP,” and dearly want it to find the (wide) audience it so richly deserves.
But Lex is right about the tea leaves: it really does look like Weinstein has shifted all of their promotional/awards marketing ammunition over to “Django” as their new anointed one.
I do, however, take exception to Lex’s lowballing of “This is 40.”
“20 total domestic”? Seriously???
While I’m kind of thinking the film may wind up underperforming (i.e., closer to “Funny People” than “Knocked Up” business), even the biggest holiday turkeys routinely do in excess of a $20-million total domestic cume. (Remember that Jim Brooks Xmas flop w/ Reese Witherspoon from a few years back? It was a complete non-starter, yet still managed to gross between $25-$30 million. And that was with middling-at-best reviews.
“40” is already faring a lot better w/ crix.)
2011 – First week of Dec – New Year’s Eve gets $13 mil, The Sitter gets $9.
2011 – Christmas week of Dec – We Bought a Zoo gets $9, The Darkest Hour gets $3.
2010 – First week of Dec – The Warrior’s Way gets $3 mil.
2010 – Christmas week of Dec – Gulliver’s Travels gets $6 mil
Lex – First weekend of Dec is the most avoided weekend of the year, especially now that they have started being more aggressive about Labor Day Weekend.
It’s very expensive – December is the most expensive month in which to market movies – and the biggest opening gross in history for the first weekend (not including movies whose opening Sat is Dec 1) is $24.3m for The Last Samurai. #2 is Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country with $18.2m. #3 is Beverly Hills Cop with $15.2m. Those are the only ones over $15m and there are only 6 others over $10m.
The theory is that people shot their moviegoing wads on Thanksgiving week. If the movie could open huge, it would open the week before Thanksgiving… open strong could open on Thanksgiving… and if you are hoping for any legs over the very fat holiday week, you need to be closer to Christmas.
If you opened Avatar 2 on the first weekend of Dec, it would be a non-issue… but then again, they would either open before Thanksgiving or close to X-Mas, hoping for January to keep playing strong, more cheaply and with less competition than in Dec.
And your point is Krillian?
i have no desire at all to watch Hobbit movie – i just can’t get into that world …watchec the first rings movies and it was okay and then i was done with it .
good luck everybody sitting through a 3 hour movie.
today i saw 6 subway billboards for this is 40 … which is more than most of the bigger movies out there .
hey LexG – did you catch K-Stew on the daily show ?
also DP – J.R.R. Tolkien needs a dp/30 . maybe he can explain what that golumm freaky thing is.
HOW DO YOU KNOW is fantastic. (Huge Witherspoon fan…)
But THIS IS 40, just seems like such a downer theme for the holidays– getting old sucks! Husband and wife drifting apart! Plus I don’t know why anyone would expect it to make much more than either WANDERLUST (Rudd, same squabbling-couple angle) or FIVE-YEAR ENGAGEMENT (Apatow factory, similar downer as romcoms go.)
I’ll see it, I like Apatow, but I can’t imagine THIS IS 40 being ANYONE’S first choice next week; Its entire potential audience would rather be at LES MIS or THE GUILT TRIP, and any guys still left onboard the Apatow Train aren’t gonna see an Apatow comedy before they see a Tarantino movie or Jack Reacher.
DP, I guess I kinda forgot LAST weekend was the dreaded “first week” since I assumed this year, technically Nov 30th counted as that post-Thanksgiving weekend that usually falls on the 2nd or 3rd or 4th, etc. I figured that sadsack weekend of dumping KILLING THEM SOFTLY was the weekend of which you speak. So this year we had two?
So the 30th, 7th, and, minus THE HOBBIT, the 14th were all AVOIDED BY LITERALLY EVERYBODY, and now in the next ten days, a workaday, non-critic, non-screenings regular jamoke like me has to make THIS many trips to a theater:
Zero Dark Thirty, On the Road, Jack Reacher, The Impossible, This is 40, The Guilt Trip, Les Miserables, Django Unchained, Promised Land, Not Fade Away, and Parental Guidance.
That’s more movies than most people see in a year. How would anyone except a completist mental patient be expected to find time for 11 SEPARATE TRIPS TO A THEATER on Christmas week?
Mania aside, all of those are gonna make more on Christmas-New Year’s than they would have had that dropped on December 7?
Lex,
Are you really going to see Parental Guidance? I know you see everything but there has to be exceptions outside of animation for stuff like PG and Joyful Noise?
LexG – nobody is forcing you to go to all these films ….if your going 11 times then you should make a video out of it and put up some new reviews. are you really going to spend like 100 bucks to watch these films ?
CRYSTAL POWER.
Lex – you ever crush a doubleheader? I almost always see two movies back to back when I go to the theater. I even did a triple a couple weeks ago.
Bless you for remembering the title of Brooks’ Reese movie, Lex.
I think you and Armond White may be the only two people who’ve admitted to liking it, lol.
But seriously.
I’m not expecting “This is 40” to be a commercial blockbuster. (The downer elements you referred to–which definitely exist in the film, but are barely alluded to in the light-hearted trailers–could make for some seriously muted wom.) I do, however, think it’ll handily outgross “How Do You Know,” “Wanderlust” and “The Five Year Engagement.”
Holy shit I just saw a Parental Guidance spot where Billy Crystal was rapping. FACE THE GUIDANCE!
How can there be THREE first weekends of December? Skyfall, Twilight, Life of Pi have all been doing some decent business the past three weeks. Why were all the studios frightened away?
Dino, see? Between that and the hits to the junk, it is an absolute MUST-SEE.
To quote John Leguizamo in Tony Scott’s masterpiece The Fan, “I’d rather staple my penis to a burning building…” then watch Parental Guidance.
Lex, I know you claim to be incapable for whatever reason of writing anything anywhere except for message boards, but I genuinely would read your reviews daily if you just put together a simple blog with an out-of-the-box template. You see every single thing and are a great writer. I remember your Melancholia review. Just do it.