26 February 2001

THE BAD: In the "He's So Gary Oldman" category, Russell Crowe couldn't keep his mouth shut about the story that director Taylor Hackford also forgot to keep his mouth shut about, Crowe's on-screen affair turned real life affair with Meg Ryan on the ill-fated movie, Proof of Life. Hackford said last week that the controversy helped kill the movie's box office chances. "I think Taylor is being impolite, impolitic and imbecilic by saying that," Crowe told reporters in London over the weekend. Yeah. But by commenting further, the story keeps getting repeated. And worse, Crowe made no friends at Warner Bros. by suggesting – accurately, in my opinion – that the movie itself was at fault. It's not that they won't be thrilled to have him in another WB movie as soon as possible… the guy is a real movie star. But they will be worried about what he has to say and how he chooses to say it every time he talks to the press.

(Note: I don't mind Oldman's brashness, though it is amazing to me that a guy who decided in a very distinct way to shut up and bite the bullet on the controversy over The Contender continues to beat the horse on show after show. In private conversation, I found that Oldman and I agree about a whole lot about what's right and wrong with this business. He's not just whining. He knows how things work and how they should work. But he's moved on with Hannibal and Rod Lurie's moving on with an amazing cast on The Castle and damned if it isn't time to just shut up and put the past, at least as the public is concerned, in the past.)

In the rest of the Gladiator saga, the film and Crowe lost out to Billy Elliot in the BAFTA Awards, which moved to this date to try to make itself important in the Oscar race. Better get CBS to broadcast the event live if they really want to be embraced. That said, they are said to have had one of their best turnouts, star-wise, in years. So, even if no one else cares, the studio publicists are hard at work.

THE UGLY: I wrote about The Hollywood Reporter… better get ready for a suit! But seriously folks, I'm out of L.A. for the week… can't really think of anything really ugly to write about. WAIT!!! Got one! Two, really. First, there was the letter, which came from a fairly major person, about the spelling of Kevin Pollak's name. That's what I get for not double checking. As it turns out, a newspaper I read this weekend also spelled Pollak's name with a "c." Ugh. Also, I got an e-mail that suggested that the English-language dubbing on Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was so good that the reader thought that the film might have been shot in both English and Mandarin. That led to a lot of conflicting mail. (See ROTD) Finally, all this ugliness seems to have driven one reader, who sends out a newsletter, to drop THB from his top go-to link to near the bottom. Whoa is me.

GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY: The FIU Miami Film Festival continues this week with twice-a night screenings during the week and four-a-day on Saturday and Sunday. Unlike many festivals, figuring out which way is up is quite easy here… just go to the Gusman Cultural Center downtown before 7 on weekdays and anytime on the weekend and you are going to have the chance to have a unique moviegoing experience. For more info, go to www.miamifilmfestival.com.

JUST WONDERING: When are they going to do a movie version of Spencer For Hire combined with The Love Boat and WKRP in Cincinnati? It seems so natural.

BAD AD WATCH: It really strikes me as disrespectful that the new ads for Hannibal feature Sir Tony frying something up in the sauce pan. It's almost as though they are now selling the movie as a macabre comedy. "The Ending You'll Never Forget." Please! I guess that marketing has to do what marketing has to do, but it seems that the movie is doing a pretty good job of selling itself without turning into a cannibal version of Porky's.

READER OF THE DAY: NT, Not Microsoft's writes: "Don't believe that email.  I've got a Region 3 DVD of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and it has the English-dubbed version on it.  It's horrible.  It certainly was not reshot in English.  While the dubbed voices do match the mouth movements of the actors (somewhat), they still speak in flat, wooden tones.  Columbia Pictures would do themselves a lot of good to keep this version hidden so as not to create a laughingstock of their movie."

But Not Race writes: "Thought you mike like to know that on the region 3 DVD of CTHD there is actually a dubbed english language version and it is very superior to the old Bruce Lee dubbed classics. Its nice for a change for someone here in the UK to get a DVD that is out elsewhere in the world before the US of A.

Strangely enough, retailers over here that sell region 1 (or U.S.) DVDs are not attempting to sell the Asian DVD. I had to buy my copy from a supermarket in London's Chinatown."

And this from S&M&More in Singapore: "Since you brought it up, the Mandarin in Crouching Tiger is atrocious. At a press screening in Singapore, the audience couldn't stop sniggering because of it.

Both Chow Yun Fat and Michelle Yeoh are not natural Mandarin speakers. Chow is from Hong Kong where Cantonese is the prevalent dialect. A Malaysian, Yeoh was schooled in England so she's more comfortable in English. I recall she admitted to learning Mandarin phonetically for the film on the Tonight Show.

It's like Jackie Chan's attempts at English, but in the context of a magical, lyrical, not-supposed-to-be-funny movie like Crouching Tiger, the awful Mandarin kinda breaks the spell for Mandarin-speaking audiences.

At least Zhang Ziyi didn't embarrass herself in this respect. Ang Lee himself is from Taiwan where Mandarin is standard.

P.S. Crouching Tiger is now available here on VCD. Legally."

E ME: So, which came first, the dumb quote or the dumb quote in response to the dumb quote?