Movie City News

Douchet

Jean Douchet est mort à 90 ans. Il était notre doyen, notre maître. L'amour du cinéma incarné. La cinéphilie ne sera plus jamais pareille sans lui. Tristesse. pic.twitter.com/ck6hyijHYB — uıɔoןɐs ןɐsuıqɐʇ (@nicolasnibat) November 22, 2019

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Gerwig and Woolf

An Ode to Women Who Walk,From Virginia Woolf to Greta Gerwig – from @lithub: https://t.co/DtWoSceM56 — hidden europe (@hiddenEurope) November 22, 2019

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Lilly SIngh warnings on Disney Plus

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Physical Media Down Under: “The film canon, film history, is constantly being rewritten; what’s a classic film and what needs to be rewatched from 60 years ago is always being decided, and I think we lose track of that with streaming The conversation shouldn’t just be about the new, fresh, pretty, shiny thing.”

Physical Media Down Under: “The film canon, film history, is constantly being rewritten; what’s a classic film and what needs to be rewatched from 60 years ago is always being decided, and I think we lose track of that with streaming The conversation shouldn’t just be about the new, fresh, pretty, shiny thing.”

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Having Eats With Lakeith Stanfield “(He’s made it to an agreeably cacophonous downtown sushi spot by this point, orders a bottle of warm sake – “I’m feeling sweet,” he tells the waiter, giving himself a little hug by way of illustration – and begins to work his way through a restorative meal of edamame, sashimi and hand-rolled sushi, all chased with Coke.)”

Having Eats With Lakeith Stanfield “(He’s made it to an agreeably cacophonous downtown sushi spot by this point, orders a bottle of warm sake – “I’m feeling sweet,” he tells the waiter, giving himself a little hug by way of illustration – and begins to work his way through a restorative meal of edamame, sashimi…

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Overlooked Nonfiction Factors Strike The Banker From Apple Slate For Now

Overlooked Nonfiction Factors Strike The Banker From Apple Slate For Now

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Developers Of New Triplex In London’s Selfridge’s Brag On Norwegian Recliners, Bags That Don’t Rustle And Food That Doesn’t Smell

Developers Of New Triplex In London’s Selfridge’s Brag On Norwegian Recliners, Bags That Don’t Rustle And Food That Doesn’t Smell

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“More films from streaming services are in the awards race this year than ever, prompting some handwringing among awards season voters — most notably AMPAS board governor Steven Spielberg — about whether SVOD films with limited theatrical runs are leading to the demise of theaters and deserving of the same consideration as traditional releases.”

“More films from streaming services are in the awards race this year than ever, prompting handwringing among awards voters — most notably AMPAS board governor Steven Spielberg — about whether SVOD films with limited theatrical runs are leading to the demise of theaters and whether they are deserving of the same consideration as traditional releases.”

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Extreme Heavy Lifting Done On Behalf Of Tenet Teaser

Extreme Heavy Lifting Done On Behalf Of Tenet Teaser

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And The Spirit Nominations…

BEST FEATURE (Award given to the producer) A HIDDEN LIFE Producers: Elisabeth Bentley, Dario Bergesio, Grant Hill, Josh Jeter CLEMENCY Producers: Timur Bekbosunov, Julian Cautherley, Bronwyn Cornelius, Peter Wong THE FAREWELL Producers: Anita Gou, Daniele Melia, Andrew Miano, Peter Saraf, Marc Turtletaub, Lulu Wang, Chris Weitz, Jane Zheng MARRIAGE STORY Producers:  Noah Baumbach, David Heyman UNCUT GEMS Producers: Eli Bush,…

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China Release Of The Farewell Bumped Two Days Before Release; May Be To Take Advantage of Anticipated Awards Notice In U. S.

China Release Of The Farewell Bumped Two Days Before Release; May Be To Take Advantage of Anticipated Awards Notice In U. S.

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David Lynch Opens “Squeaky Flies In The Mud” In Manhattan

David Lynch Opens “Squeaky Flies In The Mud” In Manhattan

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“The faces of the lovers—bereft or joyful, clouded or radiant—tell the whole story of COLD WAR. When the line between one country and another can shift overnight, where, exactly, is home? Wiktor and Zula find it and lose it, again and again, in each other’s eyes.”

“The faces of the lovers—bereft or joyful, clouded or radiant—tell the whole story of Cold War. When the line between one country and another can shift overnight, where, exactly, is home? Wiktor and Zula find it and lose it, again and again, in each other’s eyes.”

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Sex Rules, Please, We’re British: Brit Directors Issue Ninety-Six “Guidelines” For Sex Scenes

Sex Rules, Please, We’re British: Brit Directors Issue Ninety-Six “Guidelines” For Sex Scenes

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Richard Jewell

I suspect we’re about to see the same major disconnect that we saw with GREEN BOOK, where Film Twitter relentlessly crapped on a movie, causing some to underestimate how well it was going over with the Academy, which doesn’t give a crap about Film Twitter. https://t.co/55oEonAgBt — Scott Feinberg (@ScottFeinberg) November 21, 2019 “Kevin G….

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Producer Abigail Disney Endorses Elizabeth Warren Wealth Tax

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Death of News

“That first draft of history is not being written — it has completely disappeared. That’s what is so chilling about this crisis.” @juliebosman: https://t.co/Ws8lqHMAeC — Alec MacGillis (@AlecMacGillis) November 21, 2019

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Putnam Publisher Lolita

Walter Minton, who as president of G.P. Putnam’s Sons published Vladimir Nabokov’s “Lolita,” “Fannie Hill” and other sexually explicit works, has died. His NYT obit: https://t.co/RXaoDTDDTH pic.twitter.com/WS5b3I47Fu — NYT Obituaries (@NYTObits) November 21, 2019

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Czech Filmmaker Vojtech Jasny Was 93

Czech Filmmaker Vojtech Jasny Was 93

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Trump Justice Department Edict

Trump Justice Department Edict: “The end of the Paramount Decree arrives at a time when streaming is the dominant viewing mode, though changes to theatrical exhibition will affect all modes of viewing. If and when the repeal happens, studios could engage in a number of previously banned practices to increase their market hold again. What…

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Movie City News

“I don’t think it’s cruel to say this, because John himself would undoubtedly have turned it into a gleeful anecdote: When he had the stroke that killed him, he was at a local dinner theater. Hell of a review.”

“I am inclined to aver that every activity needs its critics, from narcissists bloviating in Washington to exhibitors of knee holes in their blue jeans by way of following a fad. So, too, tennis players and others wearing their caps backward. There is, to be sure, only fairly innocuous folly in puncturing pants or reversing caps, but for political or artistic or religious twisting of thought or harboring holes in the head there is rather less excuse. I have always inveighed against the bleary journalism practiced by newspaper reviewers, as opposed to the real criticism performed by, well, critics.”

“I often felt a twinge of grief at the idea that John Simon had devoted his life to a method of work that could only make him increasingly unhappy. Here was a man, elegant, articulate, and vastly knowledgeable, fluent in at least half a dozen languages, whose gifts of mind gave nothing back to the arts he wrote about except a few unkind remarks that made fun of someone’s performance, ethnicity, physical attributes, or, with a pun, on his target’s name. (“If this is Norman Wisdom, I’ll take Saxon folly.”) Other theatre critics keep such darts in their rucksacks for occasional use; John lived by them.”

“One person’s critic is another person’s crackpot. That they are not united in their opinions is ascribable to the Latin saying: quot homines, tot sententiae. I myself prefer being considered a creep, but that is what you get for having what Vladimir Nabokov called ‘Strong Opinions.’ It is odd that in a country so wallowing in negativity, starting with mass shootings and climaxing with Trump, such an unimportant matter as theater criticism should generate so much hostility. The only target patently more important is lead in the drinking water.”

Review: Little Women (no spoilers)

The DVD Wrapup: Cold War, Betty Blue, Official Secrets, Demons, Olivia, American Dreamer, Land of Yik Yak

20 Weeks To Oscar: Cinema, Trump, and Oscar

E. Scott Weinberg On Youthful Fangoria Encounters

Rome Bookstore Closes

With a Grauniad-Alleged $300 Million Budget, Could The Yet-Unseen But Surely Weird Cats Pass A Billion Dollars at The Box Office?

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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