It's the time again: Reader Questions hooray. I picked 8 to answer this week. Thanks to everyone who asked. I can't answer all but who knows - the unanswered might well inspire something down the road, conciously or otherwise. You never know...
MARSHA: Are people like Ted Cruz, Mitch McConnell, and Donald Trump just so evil and insane that they are beyond parody, or are there actors and directors you can think of who could convey their humanity and worldview?
NATHANIEL: Marsha, I promised I wasn't going to talk about politics until September, remember?!? Don't tempt me. All I will say is that a great actor can perform magic even under impossible circumstances. Remember how deep Julianne Moore was able to go with Sarah Palin?
JB: Can we discuss Drop Dead Gorgeous. In spite of having all the right ingredients, it's never quite hit cult (gay) status like I always assumed it would. Why do you think that is?
NATHANIEL: Because it's not very good? Is that too dismissive? The truth is I do kind of think of it as having achieved gay cult status. My friends and I quote it regularly and only after having rewatched it a couple of years ago (not my choice) did I realize that that was where some of the quotes had come from -- most especially "...and me without a stitch of makeup on?" when someone is looking perfectly camera ready.
But back to the question. It has the problem that many would be cult or comedy classics have in that it's trying way too hard to Be Outrageous. It opened a few years after Fargo and it's clear that it was going for "remember how funny those accents were?!" which is actually only half (at very most) of why the cast of Fargo was so funny, you know? The other thing preventing it from greatness is that the acting is all over the place, tonally, and the actresses have all been better in other films (robbing it of any 'peak moment' cache). Kirstie Alley and Denise Richards, in particular, are a problem because villains in such films are supposed to evoke "love to hate" responses (think Regina George) rather than the simpler non-endearing "want them to die they're so evil" hatred. Great Comedy is famously hard to pull off and some of this is just broad, instead of broad and sharp. But it has its great sidebar laughs, usually courtesy of Janney, Adams, Murphy and Alexandra Holden.
DR G: From the podcast it sounds like you liked Everybody Wants Some!! quite a lot... Could we get a Nick-like Twitter-sized review (and/or a grade) please? I too was surprised how much I loved it!!
NATHANIEL: I think this calls for referencing Nick directly. About Everybody Wants Some!! he writes:
Everybody Wants Some!! (16, C–): One form of privilege? Having your playlist shuffling and limp nostalgia be granted auteurist significance.
— Nick Davis (@NicksFlickPicks) April 25, 2016
He also called it lackadaisical and said he couldn't have imagined enjoying it less. Whoa! So had he seen it before the podcast it wouldn't have received the unanimous endorsement that Joe and I offered.
I can't really dispute the lackadaisical charge (guilty as charged) and I don't think of it as "great" in any particular way but I enjoyed it a helluva lot. I would probably loathe spending time with this group in real life but with the separation of the movie screen, I was up for their shenanigans and I thought the characters were all well delineated even though they shared a baseball frathouse hive brain. Yes, it's sexist and shallow but that's a reflection of the characters rather than an auteurial endorsement. (Though I suppose one could argue that the "boys will be boys" ethos is endorsement.) Even so, casually funny movies -- the ones that don't try hard -- can be so charming if they keep it under two hours which this film does (just barely). And, finally, major bonus points for: Glenn Powell, Wyatt Russell, Tyler Hoechlin, and Ryan Guzman all in top comic form; the self aware homoeroticism; and especially the good time abandon of its musical numbers - the post credit Grandmaster Flash style song was pure bliss. (You can see all my grades for the film year over here.)
CHARLEA: What do you think are the best Oscar wins for Editing so far this century, and why? I feel like some of the editing wins have been brilliant, and some have been terrible.
I would agree with this. But Oscar voters don't tend to be particularly savvy about any of the tech categories so their wins are always all over the place in quality.
But I'd rank them like so...
The Hurt Locker
- Mad Max Fury Road (2015)
- The Hurt Locker (2009)
- The Social Network (2010)
- The Departed (2006)
- Gravity (2013)
- The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)
- Black Hawk Down (2001)
- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
- Whiplash (2014)
- Traffic (2000)
- Chicago (2002)
- The Bourne Ultimatum (2007)
- The Aviator (2004)
- Slumdog Millionaire (2008)
- Crash (2005)
- Argo (2012)
I'd say that the first four were brilliant deserving choices for the statue in terms of unique and mesmerizing rhythms, coherent storytelling, and sustainment of mood. And I can get behind the first 7 for the wins in their years, mostly. Chicago's editing is fun but the attempts to cover up that Catherine Zeta Jones is the only principle who can actually dance are super obvious. I know putting Argo last will confuse people but I really thought the editing that was used to drum up tension in that movie was beyond cliché. Please note: This is not the order I would rank the overall movies in. Return of the King would go much higher but apart from that central battle I think the editing has trouble keeping that unwieldly movie sharp and focused especially given its absurd length and those multiple endings. It's awkward storytelling, sure, but the editing is not helping smooth over that weird decision to just stack a bunch of endings together. Finally, I'm well aware that The Bourne Ultimatum gets a lot of energy and thrills from its editing but it's often at the price of coherent action in terms of geography, spatial relations, and what is happening where and to whom... which is not how I like my action film editing. How I like my action film editing can be summed up like so: James Cameron Movies! (and to a lesser extent lately the Russo Bros). In Cameron's action sequences there is never any doubt about what is happening, who it's happening to, where you are, where they are, and because of the clarity it's intense and totally thrilling. The editing is never about cheap shortcuts to jack up the suspense.
BHU-RAY: I was just wondering, what other feuds would you like Ryan Murphy to cover in his new series on FX?
To those of you who are confused by this question, read this post about "Feud" which is his new anthology series. Obviously I'd love to see the Olivia de Havilland vs. Joan Fontaine but 8 episodes would never be enough. Debra Winger from 1982 through 1984 (vs Richard Gere and then Shirley Maclaine) would be awesome. James Woods and Sean Young would work because it was absolutely psychotic (but both are too low profile now for anyone to care), and then there was everyone vs everyone on Witches of Eastwick, Marilyn Monroe vs Everyone on Some Like It Hot, Cybill Shepherd vs. costars (notably Bruce Willis or Christine Baranski). And there is an absolute wealth of material available if you go into Directors vs. Stars: Alfred Hitchcock vs Tippi Hedren, David O. Russell vs. Everyone, Herbert Ross vs. Julia Roberts on Steel Magnolias
Björk vs. Lars
Werner Herzog & Klaus Kinski when they weren't trying to kill each other
Two that I would absolutely help kickstart and live for if they were any good: Werner Herzog vs. Klaus Kinski and/or Björk vs. Lars von Trier (Can you imagine... all the insanity, personality disorders, weird accents, and the sheer volume of ACTING? Emmys for everyone!)
The season of Feud that is sure to transpire (given Ryan Murphy's notoriously questionable taste) is Mia vs Woody and I will never watch that. No thank you.
KIMBERLY S: One day they will certainly do a biopic of Meryl Streep like they already have of Marilyn, Grace, Garland, Dandridge... Which actress would be perfect to play Meryl?
NATHANIEL: They won't make a biopic of Meryl because there is no drama at all to her life. Meryl Streep is a fun personality offscreen but she saves ALL the drama for the screen. When she's not on movie sets she's either at awards shows or hanging with family or making speeches for good causes. Just about the only part of her life I could see someone dramatizing some day is that tiny window of time when she was the new girl in town and lost John Cazale to cancer and married Don Gummer quickly. Either that or a season of "Feud" (Q&A synergy!) that's all about the making of Kramer vs. Kramer.
GUEST: I recently saw "Summertime", which was absolutely gorgeous. It got me to thinking: what's the most purely, aesthetically beautiful movie you've ever seen?
NATHANIEL: That's such a broad question that I thought i'd never be able to answer but then I saw Maggie Cheung strolling with noodles and plumes of smoke swirling over Tony Leung Chiu-Wai in my mind so my answer is Wong Kar Wai's In the Mood for Love (2001)
the ravishing IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE
JEFF: What are a couple of your own mom's favorite movies?
HAPPY BELATED MOTHER'S DAY AGAIN, EVERYONE! I posted a bunch of favorite screen moms on the actual day but they were off the top of my head and not to be confused with a ranking of 12 favorites of all time. Lord knows I forgot one of the best that Oscar nominee Phyllis Nagy quickly reminded me of!
@nathanielr pic.twitter.com/y212XRbNUT
— Phyllis Nagy (@PhyllisNagy) May 8, 2016
But my own mom? As previously stated, my mom l-o-v-e-s Witness (1985). She actually doesn't talk about movies all that much -- my family has been mystified as long as I can recall by the depths of my obsession -- but a few other films I know she loves: The Farmer's Daughter with Loretta Young, anything with Kevin Kline (a few years ago she was telling me about him "have you heard of this new actor Kevin Kline?" LOL! "um, mom..."), the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and musicals in general. Even though my parents aren't big movie buffs they did encourage my early enthusiasm by taking me repeatedly to a repertory house in Detroit to see movies they liked when they were young, usually for musicals, but it's also where I managed to see my first two silent movies (Thief of Baghdad and Wings) and my first super widescreen biblical epics (Ben Hur, The Robe, etcetera). That theater is still running "old movies" but hat has a different meaning now (news flash: old expands all the time and now the 1980s is old *gasp*) and here's what they're showing this summer.
YOUR TURN DEAR READERS...
- Which feuds do you hope Feud covers?
- What's your mom's favorite movie?
- Do you love and quote Drop Dead Gorgeous?