Thursday, 19 April 2001

TOO MUCH ROUGE (continued) ... 

1. IS FOX SCARED OF THIS FILM?  I’m sure that they are a little more nervous than they are letting on.  But why wouldn’t they be?  Nothing has changed in the last week to make this a mortal lock as a mainstream hit.  It is, as I just noted, the first major musical in decades.  But nothing has happened in the past week to suggest it will flop.  Fox moved their release date so that the film can play on the world’s largest stage for movie media, the Cannes Film Festival.  The film will open nationally weeks later.  If the movie is a stiff, it will be all but slaughtered by the press at Cannes and for the three weeks prior to release.  Does that sound like a strategy that a studio that isn’t behind a film would use?   No.  If the studio was worried and was simply trying to use Cannes as a slingshot, they would be going wide on May 11, two nights after the opening of Cannes, and hyping the film to within an inch of its life - and screw the critics.  That’s not what they are doing. 

2. WHY WERE L.A. SCREENINGS CANCELLED FOR EARLY THIS WEEK?  There’s only one print of the film currently available.  And it’s not in good shape.  It actually broke during the screening in New York Tuesday night.

3. WHY WAS THE L.A. JUNKET CANCELLED FOR THIS WEEK?  Nicole Kidman couldn’t make it to L.A. this weekend.   She will, however, be doing some press in New York this week and those writers have seen the film or will see it today or tomorrow.   And she will be coming to L.A. for the primary junket after Cannes and a short trip to Australia.  And there will be long lead screenings in L.A. before Cannes’ May 9 opening.

4.  WHAT NEW YORK SCREENING TUESDAY NIGHT?   Well, there was a charity screening for 400 of New York’s elite.  Does that sound like Fox is scared?

5.  IS BAZ STILLWORKING ON THE MOVIE?  Yes.  In fact, as I reported in this column last week, Jim Gianopulos and Tom Rothman received a cassette of the two completed dance numbers that I saw only a day before I saw them.  Some at Fox have seen the print that was in New York Tuesday night, but many of those working on it have not.  In the meantime, Luhrmann, who is infamously picky, has two weeks to lock the film before Cannes. 

6. DON’T SOME MOVIES SCREEN FOR JUNKET PRESS BEFORE THEY ARE FINSIHED?  Yeah.  But if Fox has to use junket press comments to drive this film, they are dead in the water anyway.  New York and L.A. critics will have a chance to see the film before it opens in their markets.  The rest of the world, including the junketeers, will see it before it opens in any of their markets.  Nothing has really happened here that might help the film if there is a problem.  Quite the opposite.  Imagine the junket 10 days after the film doesn’t win the Palm D’Or and gets shredded by Roger Ebert and Ken Turan and Elvis Mitchell… that’s an ugly picture.  That’s what Fox is risking. 

I don’t want to come off here as a myopic slave to this film - I am not.  To me, all the speculation is just more of the same careless, meaningless journalism that we in the entertainment news business get away with all the time because "they’re only movies."  Well, if you respect movies and filmmakers, you have to respect their right to finish their damned films.  This is still why I am against reviewing screenplays and/or test screenings.   If these were meant for public consumption, they would advertise test screenings and publish film screenplays before production was complete (or even started).  The movie is the movie is the movie.  None of the work product, to use a legal term, means jack.  The art form is made up of processes and only the completion of those processes demands judgment.  

Okay ... so why am I so excited about 11 minutes of clips and two scenes?  Yeah, I get it.   But those 20 minutes or so of film were put out by the director.  The 11 minute piece was cut by Luhrmann for people like me and those two musical sequences were the final product.  So ...

The movie will be open in L.A. in less than a month.  I can’t wait to see it, but I will.  And in the meantime, hold the negative speculation until you see something for God’s sakes!!!

READER OF THE DAY:  This comes from And The Tooth:  "Personally, I miss the days (of course, being almost 25, it's not like I LIVED those days!) when people, such as directors, editors, performers, etc. had to prove themselves before being declared the next whomever.  It's always a little galling to me that PT Anderson's called the next Robert Altman or Martin Scorsese after TWO movies, then goes to make the longest movie in film history, aka Magnolia (sorry, Gone With the Wind or something is probably longer, but this definitely seemed like it was).  I think what hurts these people far more than helps them is that the press is so rabid to jump on them, needing for some reason to write about the next this or that.  There's a lot of "public" magazines such as People and Entertainment Weekly which let the gossip flow like it was real news enough that perception becomes reality.  I liked U-571 and thought Matt (sorry, can't spell his last name) was wonderful in it.  He was great in A Time to Kill as well, but the Newton Boys either had a slightly off script, his acting couldn't yet handle it, or (far less likely) Linklater couldn't direct his actors. Contact needed someone who could emote more emotion than Matt can right now.

Leo has the chops, beings he's been in the business for around 10 - 15 years, but giving ANYONE $20 million after ONE film opens big seems absurd to me.  How long has it taken Harrison Ford, Tom Hanks, Mel Gibson, or Tom Cruise to reach were they are?  At least a decade of making hit after hit.Gibson's first hit was in, what, Lethal Weapon? In 1987.  Hanks' was in Big.  In 1988.  Just those two amount to now 13 - 14 years of nearly solid box office performances.  Sure, they have off years.  But for every That Thing You Do! or Patriot, you have a Green Mile or What Women Want to make up for it.  Leo didn't earn his money in The Man In The Iron Mask (I'm talking overall B.O., not the opening weekend they're really paid for) to me.

I think "new" Hollywood needs to take some advise from "old" Hollywood: Let the talent gestate, then take action.  If you lose them, wait for the next picture to bomb, then you'll be proven wrong.  If all their pictures make money, like Jim Carrey's until Man on the Moon, then you can always blame someone else...."

E ME:  I’m on my way to Bermuda.   Are you ready for anther media giant?  Are you willing to wait for Moulin Rouge?  Has Kevin Smith ever appeared as a vision to you in your life?