show biz

MANK: biting the hand

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Gary Oldman and Amanda Seyfried in MANK

David Fincher’s Mank is a black-and-white beauty of a film, a portrait of troubled talent in Classic Hollywood.

Mank is a character study of Herman J. Mankiewicz (Gary Oldman) as he pens his Oscar-winning screenplay for Citizen Kane. Mankiewicz was an Algonquin Round Table wit whose misfortune was that he despised the one thing that he excelled at. He was a master writer and fixer of Hollywood movie scripts, but he would rather have been in Manhattan trading bon mots with his peers in the intelligentsia. He particularly the industrial, ultra-commercial and course movie studio bosses and despised their politics.

It didn’t help that Mankiewicz was a raging alcoholic and compulsive gambler (although not a womanizer). He was so hard to handle that Orson Welles essentially imprisoned him at a remote California desert ranch to write Citizen Kane.

Mankiewicz had one unsurpassed idea for a script – the story of media mogul (and frustrated politician) William Randolph Hearst. Mankiewicz had been a frequent guest of Hearst and his companion Marion Davies at Hearst Castle. The problem is that telling this story would piss off the owner of the world’s biggest publicity machine and horrify the movie studio heads who employed screenwriters. And, most poignantly, it would betray Mankiewicz’s kind friend Marion Davies.

Mankiewicz had served as the court jester at Hearst Castle, and the term comes up repeatedly in Mank, most importantly in a cutting remark by Herman’s little brother Joseph Mankiewicz.

The Wife stayed with Mank and finished it, but she advised me that Mank is much more appealing to cinephiles who already know the “inside baseball” of the old movie studio system and the making of Citizen Kane. Indeed, when the likes of Louis B. Mayer, Ben Hecht, Joseph Mankiewicz, Irving Thalberg and John Houseman popped up, it instantly resonated with me.

The entire cast is excellent, but Amanda Seyfried is beyond great as Marion Davies. Charles Dance (coming off his Lord Mountbatten in The Crown) is perfect as William Randolph Hearst. Muckraker-turned-socialist-gubernatorial-candidate Upton Sinclair is played by…(wait for it)…Bill Nye the Science Guy.

David Fincher is one of our greatest directors (Se7en, Fight Club, Zodiac, The Social Network, Gone Girl). Fincher’s father Jack Fincher wrote the screnplay for Mank (and clearly shared Herman Mankiewicz’ acid view of the Hollywood hierarchy), so this is clearly a labor of love for David Fincher.

As a tribute to both Citizen Kane and the Golden Age of Hollywood, Mank is just gorgeous, as beautiful a black-and-white film as any directed by John Ford or shot by Sidney Toler, Nicholas Musuraca or John Alton. Mank’s cinematographer is Erik Messerschmidt (TV’s Mindhunter).

Mank is going on my list of Best Movies of 2020 – So Far. I see Oscar nominations coming for Fincher, Messerschmidt and Seyfried. Mank is streaming on Netflix.

GREEN BOOK: we get to spend time with Tony Lip!

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Viggo Mortensen and Mahershala Ali in GREEN BOOK

Set in 1962, Green Book is the story of Tony Lip (a burly Viggo Mortensen), an Italian-American bouncer at the Copacabana, who is enlisted to accompany a highbrow African-American musician Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali) on a concert tour of the American South.  The title refers to the pamphlet that listed African-American-friendly accommodations in the segregated South.

These guys are an odd couple – one culturally refined and intellectually curious, the other decidedly not.    Tony uses his imposing physical presence, comfort with violence and uncommon chutzpah to navigate life.  Not surprisingly, given his Bronx working class background, he is racist by today’s standard.  Shirley, on the other hand, is a sometimes fastidious Renaissance Man.  Each underestimates the other UNTIL …

Green Book is a great movie because it transcends the odd couple movie formula by probing the depths of these characters.  Tony is irascible and  enjoys disregarding the niceties of rules; early in Green Book, he see him park his car next to a fire hydrant, dump out the contents of a garbage can and then use the can to hood the hydrant.  He knows his way around the world of Wise Guys.  His appetite for his favorite foods (even in mass quantities) is admirable.  He is comfortable in his own skin and resists self-improvement (until he needs some help with romantic letters to his wife).  In Green Book, Tony Lip is not impressed by ANYTHING until he hears Don Shirley play piano.

The hyper-achiever Shirley, in contrast, is decidedly not comfortable in his own skin.  He is isolated from whites by racism and isolated from most blacks culturally.  Shirley is moody – there are multiple roots to his dissatisfaction and unhappiness – and one particular root is revealed later in the film.  Ali’s Shirley flashes an insincere showbiz smile to accept an audience’s applause, but is otherwise obsessed with always maintaining his dignity on his terms.

To their surprise, both men are affected by the other.  As inhabited by Mortensen and Ali, these are two of the most compelling characters in any odd couple movie, road trip movie or civil rights movie.

An early title says that Green Book is “inspired by true story”, and the closing credits show us the real people who are portrayed. Peter Farrelly deserves massive praise for having snagged the rights to this story and recognizing what could be done with it.  Tony Lip is a marvelous character, and Viggo Mortensen’s performance in Green Book is one of the great pleasures of this year in the movies.

A STAR IS BORN: Bradley Cooper’s triumph

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Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga in A STAR IS BORN

Don’t bring a hankie when you see A Star Is Born – bring a whole friggin’ box of Kleenex.

Actor Bradley Cooper directs this fourth movie version of A Star Is Born, and the story is essentially the same.  A celebrity artist struggles with addiction, enough to have his career teetering on the downward arc.  He befriends and mentors a young artist. They become a couple. Then her career skyrockets. Will their relationship last? Will he drag her down? Can she save him? In this version, Cooper himself plays the alcoholic rock star Jackson and Lady Gaga plays the unknown singer-songwriter Ally.

It’s a remarkably effective drama, with plenty of laughs and affecting romance. I’m not quite sure whether A Star Is Born is technically a melodrama or a tragedy, but I know that it’s a wonderful movie.

Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga in A STAR IS BORN

The key to this triumph is that it’s the creation of director Bradley Cooper, who could be well on his way to a Clint Eastwood career as both a movie star and an important filmmaker. Cooper masterfully modulates the pathos, injecting just enough humor to leaven the tragedy. But here’s the marker of artistic genius: there 7.6 billion people alive on this planet and EXACTLY ONE of them thought of remaking A Star Is Born with Lady Gaga.

Lady Gaga turns out to be a fine movie actress and perfect for the role of Ally. In this film, she’s funny, spunky, sassy, passionate, vulnerable, grieving and an overall force of nature; and when she sings – look out.

As an actor, Cooper is always appealing. Here, he’s especially good – acting only with his eyes – when he receives a harsh appraisal of his effect on Ally’s career. The wonderful Sam Elliott plays Jackson’s brother, and Cooper intentionally lowered his voice to the Sam Elliott (and Bruce Bochy) level. Rafi Gavron is especially effective as an icy, slick and ruthless Svengali. Andrew Dice Clay, Anthony Ramos and Dave Chappelle are all very good in supporting roles.

A Star Is Born is a Must See and one of 2018’s best movies.

GODARD, MON AMOUR: squandering artistic genius with political dilletantism

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Louis Garrel in A scene from Michel Hazanavicious’s GODARD, MON AMOUR, playing at the 2018 San Francisco International Film Festival, April 4 – 17, 2018. Courtesy of SFFILM.

Godard, Mon Amour is a bitingly funny portrait of flawed genius. Michel Hazanavicius (The Artist) pays tribute to the genius of filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard’s early career while satirizing Godard’s personal excesses.

Godard, Mon Amour traces the three pivotal years after Godard married Anne Wiazemsky, the 19-year-old star of his La Chinoise. Godard (Louis Garrel) is age 37. In the preceding seven years he has helped revolutionize cinema as a leader of the French New Wave. He has made three masterpieces: Breathless, Contempt and Band of Outsiders. This is the Godard of “All you need to make a movie is a girl and a gun.”

But now Godard has become a doctrinaire Maoist and rejects his past work. He sees himself as a thought leader of revolutionary politics – but that is a delusion. He’s just a political amateur, a poseur, a tourist.

Stacy Martin (center) in a scene from Michel Hazanavicious’s GODARD, MON AMOUR, playing at the 2018 San Francisco International Film Festival, April 4 – 17, 2018. Courtesy of SFFILM.

“Godard is dead”, Godard declaims. But young Anne (Stacy Martin) has hitched her star to the old Godard, the master of cinematic innovation and rock star, not this new dogmatic Godard.

This is also a snapshot of 1967, when many on the French Left believed that revolution in France was around the corner.  By 1969, it was apparent to virtually everyone that this had been a mirage, that revolution was not going to happen.  To everyone but Godard, who stubbornly stuck with his dogma.

Louis Garrel, his dreamboat looks glammed down with Godard’s bald spot, is often very funny as he deadpans his way through Godard’s pretensions.  In Godard, Mon Amour, Godard’s thinking has become so devoid of humor, nuance, texture and ambiguity that his art has become one-dimensional and boring.  Indeed, I have found all of the Godard films since 1967’s Weekend to range from disappointing to completely unwatchable.  Godard is alive at age 87 and still making movies today – and they all suck.

In his very biting send-up of Godard’s personal failings, Michel Hazanavicius pays tribute to Godard’s groundbreaking cinematic techniques.  We see jump cuts, breaking the fourth wall, shifting between color and negative imagery,
subtitling the characters’ interior thoughts over their spoken dialogue and references to earlier movies.  It’s all very witty.

There’s even a motif of repeatedly broken spectacles as an jomage to Woody Allen’s Take the Money and Run.  In one of the more obvious jokes, Godard and Anne debate whether either would choose to appear nude in a movie while they walk around their room in complete, full-frontal nudity.

The more of Godard’s films you have seen, the more enjoyable you will find Godard, Mon Amour. If you don’t get the allusions to Godard’s filmmaking, you may find the protagonist of Godard, Mon Amour to be miserably tedious.  I saw Godard, Mon Amour at the 2018 San Francisco International Film Festival (SFFILM). It opens this Friday in the Bay Area.

A CLASSY BROAD: “Done. Next!”

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Marcia Nasatir in A CLASSY BROAD

The delightful bio-doc A Classy Broad chronicles the amazingly resilient life of Marcia Nasatir, the first woman production vice-president at a major Hollywood studio.   Nasatir is now 91 years old and still pitching movies.

Nasatir has lived a singular life.  I won’t spoil her hometown, but it’s not a place that is known for producing Jewish Hollywood execs.  As a young single mom in New York, she started at the bottom of the publishing trade, and climbed to a position selling the movie rights of literary properties.  She moved to representing authors as an agent, which resulted in the motion pictures Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and Chinatown.  

Nasatir burst through the glass ceiling as a studio exec at UA, where she greenlit One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Rocky, Carrie and Apocalypse Now!  Dumped by the other suits, she became an independent producer and brought The Big Chill to the screen after it had been rejected by seventeen other companies.

Nasatir’s legacy is a huge chunk of Hollywood’s auteur era of the late 1960s through the early 1980s.  The “classy” in the movie title references an episode where she got fired when the moguls thought her movie taste was too elevated to make money for the studio.

Nasatir demonstrated enormous confidence for a woman of her era, and is the very paragon of resilience.  She met every challenge with her two-word slogan (and epitaph-to-be): “Done. Next!”

A Classy Broad screens three times at the SFJFF:

  • Cinearts (Palo Alto), Saturday, July 22 3:50 PM
  • Castro (San Francisco), Sunday, July 23 1:35 PM
  • Albany Twin (Albany), Sunday, August 6 12:15 PM

The SFJFF runs from July 20 through August 6 at theaters in San Francisco, Palo Alto, Albany, San Rafael and Oakland. You can peruse the entire program and buy tickets and passes at San Francisco Jewish Film Festival.

THE BANDIT: a buddy movie about a buddy movie

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Burt Reynolds and Hal Needham in THE BANDIT. Photo courtesy of the San Francisco Film Society.

Writer-director Jesse Moss describes The Bandit as “a buddy movie about a buddy movie”, and he’s right. The buddies are mega-star Burt Reynolds and his stuntman/friend/roommate Hal Needham, who directed the enormously successful Smokey and the Bandit franchise.

Needham, one of only two stuntmen with an Oscar, is arguably cinema’s greatest stunt performer and stunt coordinator. Reynolds did many of his own stunts, and we we see some hard, hard falls in The Bandit. But Burt did nothing to nothing to match Needham, whose FIRST career stunt was jumping off an airplane wing to tackle a rider off his horse. We see many instances where Needham became a LITERAL car crash test dummy.

One of The Bandit’s highlights is the Needham stunt that broke his back – jumping a car off a dock and onto a barge – and slamming into the barge a little short.

There’s rich source material here from Burt’s garage (Reynolds calls it “King Tut’s Tomb for documentarinans”), which stored tapes back to 1956.

For added color, Needham and Reynolds were epic partiers, who embraced and exemplified the Mad Men era. Needham was a vivid character and lived a helluva life. I strongly recommend Terry Gross’ Fresh Air interview with Needham.

Hal’s widow told Bay Area filmmaker Jesse Moss that Needham hated documentaries because they were boring, so Moss aimed to make a documentary that Hal would enjoy. Indeed, The Bandit opens with the sly Reynolds, in maroon leisure suit with flared pant legs, mocking his own image outrageously. And, it’s a hoot throughout.

(Moss’ first movie was at San Francisco’s Castro Theater in 1979, when his dad took him a double feature of Erroll Morris’ Gates of Heaven and Hardware Wars, a documentarian born!)

I saw The Bandit at its premiere at the San Francisco International Film Festival (SFFILM). It played on TV channel CMT, and now can be streamed on Amazon, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

THE GO-GO BOYS: THE INSIDE STORY OF CANNON FILMS: an improbable, wild ride

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The Go-Go Boys: The Inside Story of Cannon Films
The Go-Go Boys: The Inside Story of Cannon Films

The two Israeli filmmakers Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus had a very wild ride, and the documentary The Go-Go Boys: The Inside Story of Cannon Films is their improbable story.  Golan began as a director of Israeli films and his cousin Globus (twelve years younger) became his partner; Golan was the idea man and hands-on producer and Globus secured the financing and handled the business deals.  Together, they produced over 150 movies.

In the early 1960s, they were very successful in Israel, producing many Israeli hits, including the Oscar-nominated Sallah, which won the Golden Globe.  Ambitious, they moved to Hollywood and set up shop with a Roger Cormanesque business model – make lots of cheap exploitation movies.  They hurtled to the top of the action movie genre with movies like Death Wish II, American Ninja and The Delta Force.  Along the way, they introduced us to movie ninjas, Claude Van Dam and Chuck Norris.  The Cannon Group’s signature was the simple revenge story, adorned by naked breasts and vivid explosions.  Soon the Cannon Group was making more movies each year than all the Hollywood major studios combined.

What happened? As Icarus, the ever-aspirational Golan began to seek more mainstream credibility by producing art films and big-budget Hollywood fare.  Cannon paid Sylvester Stallone twice his usual fee to star in their arm wrestling movie Over the Top.  Generally, when a company abandons its tried and true business model…Well, you can guess what happened.

I saw The Go-Go Boys: The Inside Story of Cannon Films at the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival.  It doesn’t yet have an US theatrical release date, but I’ll try to let you all know when it’s in theaters or available on DVD or streaming.  Be sure to keep watching The Go-Go Boys right through the ending credits.

DVD/Stream of the Week: LIVING IN OBLIVION

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Peter Dinklage and Steve Buscemi in LIVING IN OBLIVION
Peter Dinklage and Steve Buscemi in LIVING IN OBLIVION

The hilarious 1995 comedy Living in Oblivion follows a grossly under-resourced indie movie director (Steve Buscemi), who must  somehow finish his low-budge/no-budget art film despite being surrounded by zanies.  He’s got a neurotic female lead (Catherine Keener), a preening and slumming A-list star named Chad Palomino (James Le Gros) and an elderly actress who can’t remember her lines (Rica Martens).  His stubborn and sullen cinematographer (Dermot Mulroney) is bedding the First Assistant Director (Danielle von Zerneck), who has an agenda of her own.  With this outfit, everything that CAN go wrong…

Living in Oblivion is filled with lines like “I can’t act. I can just do shower scenes in Richard Gere movies for the rest of my life!” and “Hey! That’s my eye patch and I don’t want anyone else wearing it. It’s insanitary.”

But the pièce de résistance is the feature debut of Peter Dinklage, 8 years before his breakout role in The Station Agent and 16 years before becoming a star in Game of Thrones.   He plays an tiny actor with a gargantuan chip on his shoulder:   “Why does my character have to be a dwarf?” and “I don’t even have dreams with dwarves in them. The only place I’ve seen dwarves in dreams is in stupid movies like this!”.

Director Tom Dicillo, having been Jim Jarmusch’s cinematographer, was no stranger to indie filmmaking.  After Living in Oblivion, Danielle von Zerneck moved on to a producing career.

Living in Oblivion is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon Instant, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Xbox Video.