RANTING & RAVING

I don’t really feel like ranting or raving… doesn’t feel like a Wednesday yet.  So let’s start with some news and see if I get rolling.

WAX MOTOR:  Huh?  I haven’t mentioned the Pledge Drive for a while and apparently, that’s been a mistake.  No one’s bought anything in days.  Anyway, we are heading into the final week of the drive.  My thanks to all of you who have already kicked in for merchandise.  Rest assured that the Ebay value will be even higher than expected as the merchandise run will be smaller than hoped for.  For the rest of you, there is still time to get your limited edition Hot Button stuff.  As you can see, we are already expanding the site and the expansion will continue.  But expansion costs time and money and we have no revenue stream at all right now, so your help is appreciated.  And best of all, you have a souvenir of the site, whether it thrills you or pisses you off on a daily basis.

REVIEWING PEARL:  There were, according to Disney, two positive glowingly reviews for Pearl Harbor from major American newspapers.  The one that scared me was Kevin Thomas’ review in the L.A. Times.  Why was it scary?  Because Kevin, nice guy that he is, is the second string reviewer at the Times and generally is put onto small movies or big movies that the paper wants a positive review for.  A positive review from Ken Turan seemed unlikely, given how much he despised Titanic.  That review, which ended up attacking Jim Cameron personally, caused quite a stink here in town and this may be the Times was trying to avoid the same.  It’s hard to believe that Disney has the power to get the Times editorial staff to assign Kevin instead of Ken, so I won’t even make that accusation.  But it is the second most curious critical event in regards to the release of this film.

The most curious event turns out to be a lot more innocuous.  I got some e-mail from people wondering aloud why Roger Ebert and Richard Roeper did not review Pearl Harbor on this weekend’s show.  That struck me odd as well.  So, I did what anyone who has been on the web for a while would do… I e-mailed Roger.  And here’s what he wrote back:

“For 20 years, I have gone to the Cannes Film Festival, and filed daily reports from there. For 20 years, that has meant we tape two shows before I go, and fill the third week with a "repeat" show. Every year a very big special effects picture opens late in May, and we always miss it. For example, one of the Star Wars pictures, or Godzilla. We are forced to review those pictures one week late.

It was not possible to see Pearl Harbor before I left for Cannes on May 8. After Cannes, I flew to London, and saw it on the Wednesday night there, and filed my print review on deadline.

Disney has never in 25 years made the slightest interference with what we review, what we say, or when we review it.

If your correspondent wants proof of my alibi, he can check out my 13 daily columns from Cannes. Some people actually think the Cannes Film Festival is important, too.

Roger”

Well, that answers that, doesn’t it?  And I guess that’s why Roger is Roger… he can be accurate and pissy and reporter-specific, all at the same time.  Love it.

ALSO REPORTING:  There is a report out there suggesting that former roughcuteer Ray Pride broke his embargo date for Pearl Harbor by releasing his review early for nefarious reasons.  Not true.  I did see the review early, though Ray was quite clear that it was not for review.  Someone else who saw the review early, Mark Ebner, sent it out in an e-mail to dozens of industry insiders… without telling Ray that it was happening.  In fact, Ebner made it into a contest of “guess the critic.”  Regardless, the review, linked to in this column last week, went up as scheduled by NewCity, not breaking the embargo or traditional review rules in any way.

FINALLY:  I must admit… I feel a little sorry for TeamDisney.  You know, they have a bad movie on their hands and they built the biggest machine to sell a movie ever.  And that must have been thrilling.  Then to have almost every movie writer in the business spray excrement all over their baby – and not just excrement, but had-too-much-cheap-Mexican-food excrement… well, it can’t be fun.  Ironically, the two guys to come out best this weekend were Michael Eisner, who insisted that the film be kept on a tight lease by Bay standards, and Jeff Katzenberg, who drove the Shrek train for DreamWorks.  Small world.

AND AT THE TIMES:  Patrick Goldstein delivered another excellent column this week, writing about the quiet but intense battle for trailer placement before major movies.  He also mentioned the Sony payments to have The Animal trailer in front of The Mummy Returns in a number of major theatre chains.  Great.  But it did strike me as very odd that when mentioning that last week, “the news broke” about the Sony payments, he didn’t mention that the news broke in an Andrew Hindes story in Inside.com.  With due respect, Patrick wouldn’t have been doing a trailer placement column were it not for Andrew’s first-like-it story about the deal.  Yes, once word was out, Sony didn’t refuse to talk to everyone about it.  But the entire subject was opened up by Hindes.  And he deserves the credit.  To read the entirety of Patrick’s fine  column, which reached deeper into the subject than Hindes’ piece did, but still… click here.

SAVE THE LAST DANCE:  I finally saw this one at the $3 movie theater this week.  Why?  Because people told me that it didn’t suck.

Well… I can say this.  Sean Patrick Thomas can be a star. Absolutely.  And Julia Stiles is really compelling… even if it was painfully apparent through the entire film that if she were forced to use the rhythm method of birth control, she would be pregnant every month, since she ain’t got none… rhythm, that is.  I think I believed her as a dancer for a total of about 18 seconds.  On top of that, she is built like a gymnast, though her thighs are not muscular enough to pull that off, not a dancer.   Don’t get me wrong, I think she’s a hottie.  And watching this movie, where director Thomas Carter managed to find every bad angle of her face, I was reminded that beauty is not always an obvious thing.  And he has it.  But the movie shoots itself in the foot by showing real ballerinas who look like what they tend to be… tiny anorexic skeletons.  

But what about the movie?  Pure TV movie stuff.  The most obvious thing that had me scratching my head is that this smart black kid on the south side of Chicago offers the white girl dance lessons.  Now, forget the race stuff… a boy in a school offers a girl dance lessons.  HUH?!?!?!?  On what planet?  Even if he wants to get close to her, he’s a lot more likely to just keep going to the club with her than finding an abandoned building with clean hardwood floors for her hip-hop training.  And how does he know anything anyway?  There isn’t even a contest that they are trying to win, like in Saturday Night Fever.  Weird.

Kerry Washington may also be a future star, but one great actor was at his worst in this movie… Terry Kinney.  Just walking through, thanks.  He plays the estranged father, who is a performer also… jazz musician.  And I’m still not sure whether I am happy or sad that his daughter NEVER WENT TO SEE HIM PLAY!  On one side, it was an obvious cliché for her to see him work and to start appreciating him more.  On the other, she got her performing itch, genetically, from him.  He gave up his wife and kid, one assumes since it’s never developed, to pursue his art without regard to responsibility.  And we never get to experience that passion with his daughter.  And don’t even get me started on him being out at an all night gig WITHOUT his instrument.  Oy!

I’m sure it will be pleasant enough on cable or video… even if the truth is that Julia as a dancer makes Jennifer Beals look like Cyd Charisse.   

CIVILIAN VOICES:  Did you see the Pearl Harbor letters yesterday?  There will be a second CV tomorrow, before we settle into once a week… or more…. Who knows?  Also, Amy Berg may be doing a political CV page of her own as the weeks go by.  That will give those of you who are offended by her liberal leanings to get a word in edgewise.  And those of you who agree, too.  If you are simply upset that there are politics on the site, please write me a CV letter to be published tomorrow.  Or write about Pearl Harbor or Save The Last Dance or Planet of the Apes or Memento or whatever.

READER OF THE DAY:  The Smooching Aussie writes:  “Aint' gonna happen, Dave. Saw the film last weekend here in Australia to a packed and somewhat embarrassed theatre. Despite what the critics are saying the two leads can sing adequately enough, and the visuals somewhat hold your attention when everything else goes goofy. But the truth of it all is that Baz Luhrmann is a terrible poet. It may be packed with dazzling images and novel dance numbers (well, some anyway) but as daring as it is, the damn movie comes off about as emotional as a seventh grade haiku. Take for instance the wretched scene in Kidman's bedroom where she and the cast have to convince The Duke to bankroll the play by dancing and singing to him like Bugs Bunny... the awfulness of the comedy could be the boldest thing put on film this year, but it's still awful.

Despite all the anachronistic flourishes and burlesque burlesquiness, Moulin Rouge at its core is selling a simple/silly idea that audiences won't respond to. It's bad poetry, dude. I'd give it an F+; failing totally but doing a wonderful job on it.”

The Height Of E-Mail writes:  “Word of mouth on Pearl is better than the reviews -- same with Moulin Rouge, which some critics hated. I was at the Ziegfeld on the May 18 opening night for Moulin. The audience loved it, applauding throughout and hugely at the end. It will do very well in wide release and probably be a nominee for Best Picture.”

E ME: Who on Pearl Harbor deserves sympathy and who deserves unceasing derision?