Out of Focus

HBO’s newest series Entourage premiered last night, and I’ve got to say I’m solidly on the fence. This thing could go either way. For a pilot episode, it was reasonably strong. The situations themselves were kind of bland, but the show let us get to know the characters, and so far, I reasonably like what I see. The casting will likely remain the best element of this show. I’m not a huge Adrian Grenier fan, but as young movie-star Vince Chase, he brings the right combination of a regular guy with exceptional looks who’s smart enough to not take too much of his new life seriously while also being adequately vacant so as to not really know what he’s doing. I give major props to executive producer Mark Wahlberg upon whose life the show is supposedly based. If that’s really the case, Wahlberg isn’t afraid to make himself look like a relatively simple fool who has to some degree lucked into his current stardom and would never be able to keep it up without his friends helping make all the decisions.

Jeremy Piven is the standout as Vince’s agent Ari who constantly goes head-to-head with Vince’s best friend, and de-facto manager, Eric played fabulously by Kevin Connolly. Eric is the straight man of the show and the most difficult character to play. He’s the guy who distances himself the most from the craziness, wanting to stay real and grounded, and Vince depends on him for those very things. Connolly brings a relaxed mood to Eric, but also isn’t afraid to mix-it-up with Ari, especially when the latter offends him by calling him “pizza-boy,” a nickname which seems ready to stick later among his friends.

Kevin Dillon — Matt’s younger brother who I’m sure you’d recognize – also is fantastic as Vince’s half-brother and wannabe actor who’s claim to fame seems to be a four-episode guest stint on Pacific Blue and maybe a Melrose Place or two. Dillon is totally making fun of his own career; while not as pathetic as his character’s — Johnny Drama — the show presents some obvious parallels.

The main problem with Entourage, so far, is that it’s just not that funny. I can see the potential, and again, this was just the first episode and they had to get a lot done in 30 minutes, but hopefully the writing will get a lot stronger. There were a couple lines that made me chuckle, but mostly, I was just noticing where the laugh-track would be had this been a three-camera network sitcom. The building blocks are there for a fun, entertaining and humorous show, even if it’s not necessarily groundbreaking. But as long as Whalberg and Co. are willing to bare all and lampoon their own world and existence, Entourage has a chance to shine.

At the very least, it’s earned a couple weeks worth of devotion.

Not sure which of these stories is a bigger deal, but while Bryan Singer seems to want to cement his place in Hollywood as the filmmaker of choice for comic book superhero films while Joe Carnahan doesn’t seem to realize that he already owes his career to Tom Cruise so he’s not allowed to have “creative differences.”

McG left, in comes Singer to direct the new Superman movie. I’ve got to say, even though I agreed with Stephen of Tagline that Warner Bros. should just give up on reviving the Superman franchise, I’m a bit more interested than he is with the possibilities now that Singer is involved. Next to the Spider-Man films, X-Men and X2 are possibly the best comic book adaptations made. If Singer can do the same thing for Superman, it may be worth it. He’s certainly a better choice than McG, and chances are, with the success of X-Men behind him, Warners may even let him do his thing with a little less studio involvement, i.e., fuck-ups.

As for Carnahan, his career got a bigtime shot of adrenaline when Narc came out at the end of 2002. For those of you who don’t know the story, Narc was making the Hollywood rounds, but nobody was willing to distribute the film. Tom Cruise got a copy of the tape and fell in love with it. He and his partner, Paula Wagner, agreed to lend their names to the credit as Executive Producers. Cruise-Wagner Productions has a deal with Paramount; they got Paramount to agree to a limited release platform, but more importantly, Carnahan was suddenly a popular name around Hollywood as a creative, visionary and exciting young director. Narc was an industry hit, which is even more important than being a commercial hit. (I’m not criticizing the film; it’s a very strong movie, with a phenomenal performance by Ray Liotta.)

So what does Cruise do? He hires Carnahan to direct the next installment of Mission: Impossible which is scheduled to start shooting soon for release as Paramount’s big tentpole next summer. After established directors like Brian De Palma on the first film and John Woo on the second, Carnahan had to look like a bit of a risk, but a potentially great one that could add some new vitality to the franchise. Whoops! Now it seems that “Joe Carnahan has dropped out of the director’s seat because of ‘creative differences.'” I guess Narc was just a good first impression, but when Tommy started getting to work with Joe directly, things didn’t work out to well. That, or Carnahan refused to convert to Scientology. Either way, I’m sure that would be enough for a firing, even if it’s not reported that way.

Where do they go now? Hmmm … I hear McG is available.

I know I haven’t exactly made this into a music blog, but hey … I’ve got the music in me! So a couple friends and I braved the Siren Music Festival this Saturday. I had wanted to go to Siren for the past couple years, but something always forced me out of town on the very weekend. So this time, we planned ahead. We didn’t manage the whole day: MTA weekend service managed to delay me meeting my friends in Ft. Greene, but we still managed to make it to Coney Island by 2 PM.

Here’s the thing: the sound. The sound was so bad. On both stages. I’ve been floating around the blogosphere this morning, and I know that Coolfer and Gothamist and I guess Stereogum all thought the show was pretty great, but maybe they all lucked out with much better (VIP!) proximity. For us, it was a lot of standing around catching sunstroke (at least until the wonderful cloud cover and breeze started around 5 or so), not always being able to see the stage — even if we were not terribly far — and listening to really crappy sound.

And by crappy, I suppose I should say bass-y. Coolfer mentions the sound being fixed during The Fiery Furnaces … I couldn’t tell. While TV on the Radio sounded slightly better (and they, along with The Constantines were probably my favorite performances), I thought the Death Cab for Cutie set was almost unlistenable, and I don’t think I was alone. By that time, we were standing relatively on level with the sound board tent, and people all around me were screaming for them to turn the bass down. I can’t imagine that it was actually better closer to the stage, but it did smooth out a little bit as we moved away. Unfortunately, since everything on the main stage seemed to start about 15 minutes late (and am I wrong, or was the other stage starting about 5 minutes early?), we had to leave before Death Cab was done with their set.

Throw in the fact that the day was absolutely exhausting, and because we wanted a decent spot for Death Cab, we decided to skip heading back to the other stage so we missed all of The Fever and Mission of Burma (two bands I would have liked to see). I enjoyed Blonde Redhead too (they were a little less bass-heavy than Death Cab), but I couldn’t help thinking how much more I’d like to see them in a smaller, indoor venue.

So the entire Q train ride back to Ft. Greene (before having to go to a party to celebrate the new Jewishness and engagement — at the party! — of two friends: Mazel Tov and congrats Dan & Abby!!), the conversation centered on, Would you do this again? On the one hand, you can’t complain about the price of admission. I would absolutely have no problem paying nothing to go again. And the lineup of bands every year is enticing. On the other, it was disgustingly hot, sweaty and uncomfortable — at least for the first few hours; we were on our feet for about 6-1/2 of the 7 hours we were there; even at 5’10” (not tall, but not tiny), I often couldn’t see around or over enough people to view even half of the stage; and, oh yeah … the sound sucked.

We didn’t come to any resolution, although that night, I’m sure we were both leaning away from doing it again. Of course, a year is a long time away. So we’ll probably see you there next summer. Just please, Village Voice and Siren fest organizers? I know it’s a free show, but get some better sound guys! Thanks.

It’s amazing how defensive some people seem to get about Vincent Gallo. While I’m not surprised at the number of people who can’t stand him out there, he’s obviously gotten plenty of people to drink his Kool-Aid. He should join with The Polyphonic Spree, and together they could start a cult for the new millennium which would obviously have some pull. Anyway, some Gallo defenders seem upset about my review of his blow-job new film The Brown Bunny, which was basically unanimously despised when it premiered at Cannes last year, but will be released in a shorter version at the end of the month. If you didn’t read it before, here it is again: I really tried to be open about it. No, really.

Meanwhile, I also wrote about The Door in the Floor a couple days ago (revisit that post here). If you’re picking a movie for the weekend and in a “selected city,” I highly encourage you to pick this one rather than, I don’t know, I, Robot. That’s not really fair because I haven’t seen the Will Smith-running-from-CGI extravaganza yet, and Alex Proyas has done some interesting work (Dark City kind of rocked), but Grambo seems to have hated it, so I’m having doubt. Don’t forget, Anchorman is out there too, and while I was a bit disappointed, it’s still funny and a good time. And another indie out there in New York and LA is the Sundance Film Festival Audience Award winner Maria Full of Grace, the story of a young woman who becomes a Columbian drug “mule.” I haven’t seen it yet but have heard great things. (UPDATED: My bad; I forgot to mention the doc Metallica: Some Kind of Monster, which also opens this weekend, and I’ve heard is absolutely fantastic. Check it out too!)

One thing Will Smith still manages to do is open a movie, and even though we’ve been beaten to death with the damn trailer, I, Robot should still have a pretty big weekend. My fearless forecast (which resembles a Magic 8-Ball) tells me that the Fresh Prince will attract about $45-Million this weekend, with Spider-Man 2 still holding strong with about $25-Million (which should bring it very close to $300-Million in just 19 days). Anchorman should also retain a good chunk of its opening and earn $17-Million, while I’m guessing King Arthur takes a big tumble, collecting about $7-Million which may be just enough to keep it in the top 5. The wild-card is the new Hilary Duff starrer A Cinderella Story. Even with Karen Cinecultist’s announced boycott, I think the movie has a shot at taking the #3 slot away from Anchorman. The Lizzie McGuire Movie opened with over $17-Million, Duff is more popular now than then, and this movie definitely doesn’t compete for audience with any of the other potential top-grossers. $20-Million to open. How’s that?

Suddenly George Eads and Jorja Fox think they’re in the cast of Friends. The two C.S.I. players don’t seem to realize that they’re show has much more in common with Law & Order, meaning that they’re supporting actors — not stars — and basically expendable. Eads and Fox reportedly have both been fired for asking for a raise in the fifth year of their (standard) 7 year contract. Let’s put this in perspective people, because I’m all for actors making their bucks. But here’s a little lesson in TV acting contracts. When I worked at an agency about 8 years ago, any regular cast member on a major network hour long drama could plan on at least $15,000 per episode in the first year of a series. (And that is a very conservative number.) If that actor has been in other series or even other pilots that weren’t picked-up, that number would have been potentially much higher, and this many years later, it probably is higher already. If a show runs a full season (usually 23 episodes), that would be about $345,000 for approximately 30 weeks work. Even losing 60% to taxes, agents and managers, they’re bringing home $138,000, with nearly half the year left to look for other parts. And that’s the bare minimum. Each season the show gets picked-up, the standard contract usually offers a 5% bump on the episode rate. So season 2 would be $15,750, season 3 would be $16,537.50, and so on. I would bet that neither Eads nor Fox started at that low a figure: $25,000 per episode or higher is much more likely, and I still could be vastly underestimating. CSI is making a shitload of money, and everyone involved deserves to be compensated, but you have a contract, and while you can try to renegotiate, show up for work. If you don’t, and you’re on a show like C.S.I., you’re an idiot, and deserve to be fired … just like Eads and Fox. Don’t get me wrong, the majority of actors don’t get cast on series that become television phenomena and therefore they don’t make this kind of money. But that’s the point: when you do make it like this, take a lesson from George Clooney who could have renegotiated with ER repeatedly or even left the show, but after all his failed attempts at stardom, he decided not to, played out his contract and is doing just fine.

Who ever said LA doesn’t have good theater? I sure am sorry I live in NYC when that means I’ll likely have to miss Val Kilmer starring as Moses in a stage musical version of The Ten Commandments. Damn! Hopefully, this pending monster of the modern stage will come to Broadway, maybe even arriving around the same time as Masada — assuming the troubled production makes it here — because there’s nothing like ancient Jewish/biblical musical drama onstage, you know?

And in the most important news of the day, American Idol will let old people compete this next season, as long as they’re not over 28. Thankfully, this two year raising of the age limit is only on the older side of things. Crappy 16 year olds will still be allowed to embarras themselves on TV as well by singing songs about their broken hearts, lost loves and trying lives. Yay!

Have a great weekend, and see you at Siren!

I got home last night to find the August schedule for the Walter Reade Theater at Lincoln Center in my mail, and staring at me on the cover is none other than Jimmy Stewart in a scene from The Man from Laramie. You know why? Anthony-effin-Mann, that’s why. These days, I can’t go to a movie without seeing a trailer for Collateral from director Michael Mann. I know Michael has his followers, but I’ve never been such a big fan. I think all his films are at least 30 minutes too long, and he’s basically an awful storyteller. He has a great visual eye, and every film contains a few brilliant sequences, but otherwise, they bore me. I know people love Heat, but I thought it was rather dull, except for the brilliantly choreographed bank heist and the diner scene with Al Pacino and Robert De Niro. Ali was a total snore, and that really should have been an impossibility. The Insider was good (not amazing) primarily due to the fantastic performances and the fascinating story, and frankly, it could have been better. If only Michael Mann could take some lessons from Anthony Mann (no relation), he’d be a much better filmmaker.

Dark Streets and Vast Horizons: The American Vision of Anthony Mann is a series that will run at the Walter Reade from August 11-29. If I could go to ever single film in the series, I would; and if Michael is the only Mann you know, you should.

Mann was one of the greatest American directors working in the 40s and 50s, but except to film enthusiasts, he’s no longer as well known as the big names of the day: John Ford, Howard Hawks, John Huston, etc. Still, an argument could be made without too much difficulty that Mann was the most influential filmmaker to the development of two particularly American-specific genres in post-WWII, cold war America: the Western and film noir. The French cineastes writing for Cahiers du Cinema and who created the nouvelle vague considered Mann one of the most important directors working in this period, and if you see his movies, you’ll understand why.

His work with visionary cinematographer John Alton (possibly the most important noir DP ever) in films — especially T-Men and Raw Deal, both screening in this series — have (maybe even unknowingly) influenced many of today’s filmmakers who search for ways to create more interesting visual tableaus. Even today, it’s difficult to match the gritty and shady beauty of these movies, and not ever having seen them on a big screen, you can bet your ass I’ll be there.

Mann also collaborated frequently with Stewart on several westerns, not to mention the biography of bandleader Glenn Miller. The Man from Laramie, Winchester ’73, and The Naked Spur are all considered among the greatest films of the genre, even if none of them carry the same popular notoriety today of the iconic John Ford/John Wayne collaborations.

Mann is a filmmaker who deserves a comprehensive celebration of his important contribution to cinema, and as they often do, the Walter Reade comes through this August. There are plenty of notable titles among the 25 in this series I haven’t mentioned, including what is probably his most well-known, El Cid starring Charlton Heston and Sophia Loren. I highly encourage anyone in New York to give some of his films a try.

P.S.: Completely unrelated to either Mann, the Walter Reade will also be “celebrating the opening of the 2004 Republican Convention with this tribute to the man behind the man in the Ocal Office, Karl Rove.” How will they celebrate? With all day screenings on August 30 of the new documentary Bush’s Brain which premiered earlier this year at the Tribeca Film Festival.

Some quick hits, immediate reactions to the major Emmy Award nominations announced this morning in LA by Edie Falco and Tony Shalhoub:

Continue reading “THIS IS WHY THE EMMYS ARE ONLY SLIGHTLY LESS LAUGHABLE THAN THE GRAMMYS”

A couple weeks ago I attended a screening of The Door in the Floor, which opens in NYC and LA (and I guess some other places) today. And that headline is true. There’s a lot of nudity in this movie: Mimi Rogers gives some full-frontal and Kim Basinger has a few all nude scenes, and Jeff Bridges (who is excellent here) shows some tush. Do we get even one shot of Bijou, the girl who wore basically handkerchiefs or nothing throughout the film Bully? Nope. Does it matter? Nope. In fact, she’s kind of skinny, and the 48 yearold Rogers and 51 (!) year old Basinger look amazing. But enough about skin.

I was originally a bit conflicted about my feelings regarding this film. But The Door in the Floor is a film that stuck with me a bit. After seeing it, I told someone that it was kind of like a mix between Tadpole and In the Bedroom, but I don’t know that it’s really such a good comparison. I mention Tadpole only because this film involves an older woman having a sexual affair with a teenage boy, but The Door in the Floor is better and not really a comedy. In the Bedroom deals with some similar themes of parental loss and sadness, but really in a different way, and the main similarity is in overall mood and tone.

For those of you who don’t know, The Door in the Floor is apparently based on the first 100 pages of John Irving’s novel “A Widow For One Year.” It basically depicts the story of the disintegrating marriage of noted philanderer, children’s author, and artist Ted Cole (Bridges) and his wife Marion (Basinger), years after the tragic death of their two teenage sons, an event from which Marion has never quite recovered. The story in the film is told through the eyes of Eddie (newcomer Jon Foster), a teenager who has traveled out to the Coles’ Hamptons house to “apprentice” Ted as he works on a new children’s book. He gets caught up in the middle of this troubled relationship, especially when he starts fucking Marion.

Continue reading “WOULD YOU BELIEVE BIJOU PHILLIPS IS THE ONLY PERSON NOT NAKED IN THIS MOVIE?”

So I won’t. I previously commented on McG‘s involvement in Warner Bros.’ new attempt at a Superman franchise. As several other bloggers have noted, the reports flew around yesterday that the director is off the project. Thank goodness. But Stephen at Tagline has written the best and most comprehensive arguments on why Warners should just scrap the whole thing … and focus on Wonder Woman instead!

Also, I often find myself posting on a similar topic as the cinetrix at just about the same time, and usually I discover that her treatment is far more biting than mine. A perfect example today: read the first item below and compare to this. Take that Sharon!

And as for Jeopardy brainiac Ken Jennings? Bunsen has plans for you that suit me just fine.

UPDATED: How could I forget: Uncle Grambo’s brilliant sports analogy explaining why VH-1’s I Love the ’90s kind of doesn’t cut it (third item). Obvs.

Sharon Stone, obviously knowing that Catwoman isn’t going to do the trick in reclaiming her 15 minutes of superstardom, claims that the on-again-off-again Basic Instinct 2 is now on-again. Sharon , nobody cares. I didn’t give a crap about a sequel in the mid-90s when it might have made a little bit of sense. I sure as hell don’t care now. My fearless prediction: if a Basic Instinct 2 ever gets off the ground, it will suffer the same fate as The Two Jakes and Texasville, two sequels unnecessarily produced and released long after their predecessors. I’m not saying sequels always need to follow immediately, but there needs to be more of a reason than cashing in on the original’s character. And at least with these other two films, they had original pedigree that far outshines a slightly above average thriller remembered primarily for one scene that really did nothing more than eventually inspire Paris Hilton.

The movie version of the very funny Comedy Central show Strangers With Candy featuring the great Amy Sedaris seems to have taken one step towards becoming a reality. David Letterman’s Worldwide Pants shingle has come on board as producers: “‘Amy Sedaris is one of a handful of folks who actually make me laugh,’ Letterman said.” Me too, Dave. Me too.

The scariest thing to me about Sci Fi Channel’s series Scare Tactics is their choice of has-been stars as hosts. It appears Shannen Doherty has left the show. Variety says “Thesp is pursuing a pair of projects for the Peacock.” Peacock means NBC, for those of you not into the trades slang. I like that they called her “thesp.” As in “thespian.” I remember when I liked Shannen, but that was a long time ago. Anywho, her replacement seems to be none other than the youngest and most starfucking Baldwin: Stephen. Congrats Stevie. Who woulda thunk that Bio-Dome and Half Baked would have been high points. To think you actually were in The Usual Suspects, too.

Potentially good comedy news for all: Steve Carell gets cast in the lead of a film called Furry Vengeance. All I can do is quote Lindsay and say “Yay!” More Carell is a good thing. He’s usually one of the best and most memorable elements of anything he’s in, Bruce Almighty and Anchorman being prime examples.

I wanted to take a brief moment to flaunt my obvious skills at predicting the weekend box-office. Yeah, so Spider-Man 2 made $10-Mil less than I expected, and while I was right about the “relatively disappointing” part, King Arthur couldn’t even get to the $20-Mil I predicted, falling $5-Mil short. I was $5-Mil short on Fahrenheit 9/11 for the weekend too, although I did have its placement right. And, I knew there was no way Sleepover was cracking the top 5, as it landed at #10. However, “Will Ferrell comes in second with $28-Million.” Yeah! Dead on. I’m so proud.

And finally, R.I.P. to Carlo Di Palma. Who? Di Palma was an Italian cinematographer who shot of Woody Allen’s films dating back to Hannah and Her Sisters, and he died last Friday at the age of 79. He started as a camera assistant working on Italian classics such as Visconti‘s Ossessione, Rossellini‘s Roma, Citta Apera a/k/a Open City and De Sica’s The Bicycle Thief. He worked four times as the great Michelangelo Antonioni‘s DP, particularly on the influential Red Desert. If you want an interesting double-feature somewhat influenced by Di Palma, watch another notable Antonioni collaboration, Blowup, and then for kicks take a look at Brian De Palma‘s Americanized version of the story using sound rather than pictures, Blow Out.

This post is dedicated to the cable-less Cinetrix, who I’m sure could wipe the floor with me head-to-head on this show.

Friday night was the premiere of IFC‘s new game show Ultimate Film Fanatic hosted by Chris Gore of Film Threat. While the show is by no means an exact duplicate of MTV’s old Remote Control, it’s low-budget look, too-hip-for-you tone and the equivalent of film pop culture questions owe as much to this earlier game show as to the independent film reality it’s trying to represent. Who the hell talks about how a game show is shot and edited? I guess I have to with this one. Tilted and black & white frames, cross-fades and fade-outs when contestants are eliminated, and Gore’s disembodied voiceovers saying goodbye to those who fail to move on all reek of the show’s attempt to say, “It’s not TV. It’s IFC.”

But beyond that, is the game any good? After just one episode, I’m kind of on the fence. I suppose I was expecting something more daunting. Really difficult questions about all kinds of films, especially more indie and obscure ones. I was expecting people who wouldn’t just look the part of “film geek,” but really embody the meaning of the word “fanatic,” as opposed to just “fan.” I suppose I was really most disappointed in the format due to the relatively arbitrary way that contestants not only move on from round-to-round but ultimately win each show earning a place in the “national finals.”

Continue reading “FLASHBACKS OF KEN OBER, COLIN QUINN AND KARI WUHRER, JUST NOT QUITE AS FUN”