The Hot Button by David Poland

Tuesday, 5 January 1999

MORE CRIX PICK FLIX: The National Society of Film Critics got around to handing out their awards on Sunday. In 1999! What a concept! Waiting until 1998 ends to give awards! (It'll probably turn out that only three people out of 50 voted and that those three had peg legs and parrots on their shoulders. I hope not.) In any case, Out of Sight took Best Picture, which is an interesting choice. Much as I liked the film (see my Top 10 List), I don't know whether it's of a weight to be the very best of the year. But, then again, this group may really be trying to adjust the balance against the weight of all the other critics' awards and the tarnished Globes. Amongst the actors, Nick Nolte got Best Actor for Affliction, Ally Sheedy got Best Actress for High Art, Bill Murray got Best Supporting Actor for Rushmore and Judi Dench got Best Supporting Actress for Shakespeare in Love. Amongst the closest votes were for Best Director (Steven Soderbergh over Terrence Malick), Best Supporting Actress (Dench over Patricia Clarkson in High Art and Lisa Kudrow in The Opposite of Sex), Best Screenplay (Out of Sight just beating out Shakespeare in Love and Rushmore) and Cinematography (John Toll's work on The Thin Red Line just beating Janusz Kaminski's turn on Saving Private Ryan).

THUMBING UP: Siskel and Ebert made their Top 10 picks last week. Looking at their choices really relays the uniqueness of vision in each of us who feels empowered to publish opinions. Saving Private Ryan, Pleasantville, Shakespeare in Love and Babe: Pig in the City are the four films that made both critics' lists. Two of those four wouldn't make my Top 20, so go figure. Roger's was, for me, a much better list (from top to bottom, Dark City, Pleasantville, Saving Private Ryan, A Simple Plan, Happiness, Elizabeth, Babe: Pig in the City, Shakespeare in Love, Life is Beautiful and Primary Colors). Not a single pick that makes my gagging reflex kick in, though I have to believe in the pit of my stomach that Dark City is an "attitude adjustment" pick. It is a pick for a film that deserved a lot better treatment, but Best of 1998? Tough to figure. Siskel, on the other hand, included a few films that brought lunch to the edge of expulsion. (In order, Babe: Pig in the City, The Thin Red Line, Pleasantville, Saving Private Ryan, Shakespeare in Love, The Truman Show, Antz, Simon Birch, There's Something About Mary and Waking Ned Devine.) Simon Birch?!?! Antz better than A Bug's Life? The Truman Show AND Pleasantville? Oy! I do find it interesting that both men seem to have made choices for the top spot that are undervalued films that created fantasy worlds in exceptional ways. That suggests both boredom with the status quo and a real understanding of the power that they wield in this country. And that's not so bad.
HOUSE OF ART: The holiday weekend numbers are in for the exclusive and limited releases. The Thin Red Line continues to draw packed houses on the coasts ($376,000 in seven theaters), hoping to build up steam for a major Jan. 15 expansion. (The film hits 10 new markets this weekend in a smaller expansion.) Hurlyburly managed $176,000 on 16 screens, supported mostly by the non-NYC/L.A. markets. Affliction did $68,000 in three NYC/L.A. theaters. Hilary and Jackie picked up $96,700 in six NYC/L.A. theaters. In one-screen Oscar runs, Playing by Heart did $28,000 last weekend and Another Day in Paradise did $16,000 just a block away here in Los Angeles. Finally, The Hi-Lo Country suffered on its choice of three screens, doing just $19,000 between them. (More on that in ROTD) And one last note. Shakespeare in Love goes to 800 screens next weekend. Anything more than $5 million will have to be considered a major success for the film that has already neared the $10 million mark in its limited run alone.
BACK TO BUSCH: Just a few years ago, Anita Busch left The Hollywood Reporter for Daily Variety, leaving her Reporter pals pissed in the wake. At that point, she became the second highest paid entertainment reporter at the trades. (Variety's Michael Fleming was and still is the top dog.) But things didn't work out at Variety, and Busch's exit was followed up by a series of unkind words from those who worked with her. Anita next took a desk at Entertainment Weekly, where conflicts about "who's beat is it anyway" led to a quick departure. Still loaded to the gills with industry contacts, Busch freelanced at the New York Times, Vanity Fair, Time, Premiere and Advertising Age. And now, while former THR editor Alex Ben Block swings in the wind after his shockingly quick dismissal from Morgan Creek, the company he left the Reporter for (rumor has it that he was late for work and was summarily dismissed for that by the erratic Jim Robinson), Busch has taken the reins as editor of the smaller format industry trade. But will Ms. Busch be happy at last? Who knows? All we can know for sure is that sex-free incest is really Hollywood's favorite indoor activity.
MOR-MOR-MOR, MAN: The Hollywood Reporter reports that the Screen Actors Guild made a deal with the Mormon Church to go union on the church's industrial and educational films. Part of the deal is that actors can be required by contract "to live in accordance with church standards during the production." The line to sign up for acting gigs that not only allow but encourage actors to engage in bigamy is likely to stretch around the block. Speaking of which...
MARCHING TO SUNDANCE: The Hot Button is heading to Sundance and I'm dragging you along with me. Today's focus is on Guinevere, a film from writer and first-time director Audrey Wells. (I don't want to scare anyone, but Audrey's writing credits include George of the Jungle and The Truth About Cats and Dogs.) This one stars Sarah Polley, who is emerging as the next important indie actress, as Harper Sloane, a woman who, on her way to Harvard Law School, gets waylaid by a guy. The guy is Stephen Rea and coming of age gets to be a very bumpy ride indeed. (Rea is also the person who nicknames Harper "Guinevere," as if someone named Harper needs a nickname.) The film is one of the first attempts by hack producers Avi Lerner, Trevor Short and Danny Dimbort to break into the art world, so I suspect that Ms. Wells got to do as she really wanted. And with additional performances by Jean Smart, Gina Gershon and Jasmine Guy, this could be one of the most commercial films of the festival. Another film tomorrow.
WAG THE VIDEO: While Wag the Dog was clearly hurt financially while in theaters late last year (or was that two years ago? I hate this year change thing!), the home video business for the title continues to boom. When the U.S. bombed Iraq a few weeks ago, sales of the video jumped by 50 percent from the previous weeks. And it continues to be a strong rental title. Just wait 'til they see the rush for Presidential Kneepads: The Movie, with Elizabeth Berkley as Monique and Joan Allen as the Suffering First Lady. No, not true. But neither is it true that Larry Flynt has purchased a plot of land for Clinton in Malibu and has a job waiting for the president at Hustler as CEO when he exits the White House. (I'll let you make up the words that CEO would stand for in this case.)
READER OF THE DAY: Greybird wrote: "On New Year's Day, I saw The Hi-Lo Country at Loew's 19th Street, one of the two theaters in NYC where it is playing. To my surprise, I was shunted into the smallest auditorium of the six-plex, where the sound buzzed and the image didn't quite fit the frame. I envied those West Coast folks who were enjoying this film on a huge screen with first rate sound. Now I find out the Hi-Lo experience is bi-coastal. What's the point of opening a film under these conditions? I don't know how much of my dissatisfaction with the film resulted from the poor visual and aural experience. I basically responded only to Woody Harrelson's performance. For me the film just didn't feel right, but so much of that could have been that the movie-going experience itself didn't feel right."
And this from Jeff: "I used to work for one of the smaller theater chains in Los Angeles and fortunately we had little real problem with talking in our theaters -- since we showed mostly foreign films with subtitles, people remained fairly quiet because they wanted to pay attention to the film and the words onscreen! At other theaters, the problem is rampant. And it isn't just talkers -- it's also smokers, alcoholic-beverage smugglers (you know that wonderful sound of a glass bottle rolling all the way down?) and even video pirates who sneak in camcorders to shoot the film off the screen (what a beautiful picture that is going to be!). And with projectionists becoming fewer and fewer and being replaced with... concessionaires running the booths, it is no wonder that the presentation of movies in theaters is worsening. It comes down to giving a good show and the vast majority of movie theaters have gone from making sure the film looks good to making sure the concession stand looks good, with the film secondary."
A very recent example of this: My wife and I saw The Prince of Egypt this past weekend (not a bad film) at a multiplex in Glendale, Calif. As the end credits were rolling, there was a splice, and suddenly the credits were appearing at both the top and bottom of the screen! As we left, I told one of the ushers/concession people/bodies working there about the problem, and I got that glassy look that 99 percent of that group seemed to have and the reply 'uhwe'lltakecareofit,' which probably put the complaint into the 'autoerase in five seconds file.' I know that most movie workers basically want the job to get passes to other theaters and because it is a better job than working at Mickey D's -- no one ever gets rich working in a theater unless you are skimming off the sales -- but can't the people in management do something to give these people some pride in their jobs instead of making them feel like glorified janitors? I know I tried to do that when I was working in theaters, but if this trend continues, you'll probably get better customer service in your own home theater, and that would be too bad."

E ME: Theater complaints. What's your worst horror story? The horror. The horror.