4/ 1/08
9:31 AM
It Wasn’t Harvey Weinstein: On Anthony Minghella’s Legacy, Again

Truly, Madly, DeeplyPhoto courtesy of Samuel Goldwyn Films
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Truly, Madly, DeeplyPhoto courtesy of Samuel Goldwyn Films

Photo: FilmMagic
Do I have evidence? Peter Biskind’s chronicle of the indie movement, Down and Dirty Pictures, provides some. But I’m less interested in what happened behind the screen than in the compromises in front of it.

Say, do you smell smoke?: Burning the Future: Coal in AmericaPhoto courtesy of Firefly Pix

Photo: Getty Images
To: David Edelstein
Sent: Monday, February 25, 2008 3:11 PM
From: Lynda Obst
Subject: RE: No Country for Good CheerDear David,
There was some love and some surprises that kept the night from becoming an utter snooze-fest, with way too many clips threatening to become one long clip of Cary Grant morphing into Cuba Gooding Jr. There was no real evidence that the writers were back: Aside from Jon Stewart’s lines and Jonah Hill and Seth Rogen’s hilarious turn as Oscar perennials Halle Berry and Dame Judy Dench (next year Hillary Swank and Helen Mirren), the content was more spliced-together than it was written. At one point, the producer/chef/host of my party cried out, “These are the worst Oscars since I was born!”

Photo: Getty Images
To: Lynda Obst
Sent: Monday, February 25, 2008 9:08 AM
From: David Edelstein
Subject: RE: No Country for Good CheerHi Lynda,
Was that especially uneventful, Lynda, or will all Oscar ceremonies henceforth play as if they’d already happened once before in a galaxy far, far away? Not at all the Mardi Gras blowout I’d hoped for. Even Diablo Cody was simple, modest — everything her screenplay wasn’t. Is it that YouTube has made even exhibitionists more self-conscious in the knowledge that their gaffes will be replayed millions of times? I’m really reaching to say something of sociological interest Maybe we should just blame producer Gil Cates, who makes the trains run on time at the expense of all spontaneity. It’s why I gave up on Saturday Night Live, the least “live” show imaginable, insofar as anyone who dares to depart from the script gets exiled to Siberia
As Oscar night approaches, David Edelstein and Hollywood producer Lynda Obst are discussing the race. Check back here Monday morning for reactions.
To: David Edelstein
Sent: Saturday, February 23, 2008 5:08 PM
From: Lynda Obst
Subject: RE: No Country for Good CheerDear David,
It is Oscar season after all: I saw George Clooney in the flesh and Harvey Weinstein in a suit that made him look like a villain in a Batman sequel, which was not pretty. George Clooney, though, was extraordinarily pretty. I don’t remember what he was wearing except for that smile, which should be patented. It dazzled more brightly than any lighting in Bryan Lourd’s packed atelier. George’s girlfriend patiently stood by as he complimented his admirers of each gender, as if he hadn’t had them at hello.

Josh Brolin didn't manage to blow away the Academy, either.Photo courtesy of Miramax
To: Lynda Obst
Sent: Friday, February 22, 2008 9:08 AM
From: David Edelstein
Subject: RE: No Country for Good CheerDear Lynda,
Your evocative post of Tuesday last — which suggested that you and your Hollywood colleagues have not recovered emotionally from the writers’ strike — bodes well for No Country for Old Men, which in another year might only have been the first choice of suicidal depressives. You also shamed me. Having had my critical say on the nominated films in this magazine, I was eager to talk Oscar politics and to snigger at Academy voters’ middlebrow taste, while you — the big-studio producer — insisted on addressing many of the nominees’ artistic merits and reminding me that there is, in fact, little difference this year between the critics’ favorites and the industry’s. Sure, I thought Atonement was weak tea and would have liked a little Best Picture love for The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. But even there the directing nod for Julian Schnabel suggests the votes were close. And Diving Bell is in French, and no one could tolerate a French picture (even with an American director and a Brit screenwriter) taking home the grand prize. (Has that ever happened?) I apologize for my condescension.
"My heart sank when I heard Gil Cates was back in the Oscar ceremony producer's chair." »

Marion Cotillard in the “under-frog” film La Vie en Rose.Photo courtesy of TFM Distribution
To: David Edelstein
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2008 12:38 PM
From: Lynda Obst
Subject: RE: No Country for Good CheerDear David,
To say it’s been the winter of our discontent doesn’t overstate the despair that has gripped Hollywood since late October — as you know, having shared in the Hollywood bummer that was the writers' strike. Now that it’s over — having suffered through a party-less, drama-less, impoverished Globes season, not to mention that eight-week strike, which cost the local economy some $3 billion — we have arrived at something to celebrate. And what this town needs is a good bash: Half the place seems in the mood to get gussied up and let bygones by bygones, while the other half probably still feels like throwing a few back in a crew bar and having it out with their local studio head/agent/ producer/writer. Still, even Graydon Carter canceled his big party in favor of Chinese food in bed. The only option is to start the betting pool and declare it Pajama Oscar year.

Screw it. He's gonna smoke your pipe tobacco, too.Photo courtesy of Paramount Vantage
To: Lynda Obst
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2008 12:38 PM
From: David Edelstein
Subject: No Country for Good CheerDear Lynda:
Well, well, well, we do get to talk about the Academy Awards this year. Despite the cancellation of the Golden Globes ceremony (quel agony!), there was no way that Hollywood could have gone without its annual orgy of self-congratulation — the best incentive from a public-relations standpoint to settle the strike. For moviegoers, a year without Oscar is unimaginable. So little in our culture has value on its own terms: Without the opening of the envelope, there is no climax, no catharsis.

Frank Langella in Starting Out in the Evening: Robbed! Robbed!Photo: Courtesy of Roadside Attractions
Will there be a ceremony? I have no clue. Most of the talent will not cross a picket line, which would mean an Academy Award ceremony very much like the one in The Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult, hosted by Pia Zadora. (I suspect that O.J. would be available, too.) Can Hollywood possibly do without its annual ritual of self-pleasuring?

"Great! Now it's flicking cigarette butts at us!"Courtesy of Paramount
Nothing can be scarier than something, though. The Blair Witch Project, shot with one video camera from the point of view of the character holding it, proved that when you eliminate the omniscient perspective — when you show the audience only what a single character sees and no more — you introduce a note of irrational terror that millions of dollars of computer-generated effects can’t touch. But Blair Witch was a ghost story, a genre in which less is always more. What, asked writer Drew Goddard, if you used the same singular, disoriented vantage for a giant-monster picture, a spectacle: Godzilla through the eyes — or lens — of a sap way down below trying not to get stomped?

No. 1 film: The Diving Bell and Butterfly.Photo: Courtesy of Miramax
Enough commentary. Time for list-making.
1. The Diving Bell and Butterfly
2. Away From Her
3. There Will Be Blood
4. Sweeney Todd
5. The Savages
6. No Country for Old Men
7. No End in Sight
8. Michael Clayton
9. Ratatouille and Persepolis (Tie)
10. Grace Is Gone
Sticklers can stop here. Others should go on.
Ten more where that came from. Plus: Best Actors, Actresses, and Supporting Actors and Actresses. »
The one that I promised, in the new issue of the magazine, that you would find here? It’s on its way — and it will indeed go to eleven.
The Year in Movies [NYM]

Less Dylan than Chuck Barris?Photo: Courtesy of Weinstein Co.

Courtesy of Paramount Pictures, Kino Video, Paramount Pictures

Tamara Jenkins directs Phillip Seymour Hoffman on the set of The Savages.Photo: Courtesy of 20th Century Fox

Hey! We're talking to you!Photo: WireImage
In Salon, Richard Corliss vehemently denies he was the writer threatened with retaliation if he didn’t soften a piece on Rush Limbaugh. He calls my theory “irresponsible bullshit” and says he was not contacted by Limbaugh (or, presumably, anyone connected with Limbaugh, who implied on the air that it was his people, not him, who made the threats).

"We're going to find out who you knocked up in high school."Photo: Getty Images
Despite its reputation as a hard-core left-wing propaganda machine, the main job of Media Matters for America is transcribing and/or reprinting the more outrageous lines of right-wing politicians and their water-carriers in newspapers, magazines, TV, and radio. Yes, it fact-checks — but how can it be a smear outfit when these are people’s own words? And these words by Rush Limbaugh were freaky and terrifying for all kinds of reasons — some ethical, some psychopathological. But for me, one phrase stood out (italics mine).
"You are no different than Al Goldstein. You both masturbate." »

De Palma at Monday night's press conference. No, really, he got pretty pissed.Photo: Getty Images
Welcome to The Projectionist
What to expect from David Edelstein's movie blog.