October 4, 2002

As I sit down to write today’s column, the score of The Godfather is floating around in my brainpan… “The power of Christ compels you…”

The Superman story has fallen off the Ain’t It Cool wagon.  I guess it’s time to take a position on the whole debacle. 

Village Voice Media and New Times conspired to make the L.A. Weekly the only alternative voice of significance on the Los Angeles scene, at least for now, and disappeared the five year history from the web in the process. 

Manito has finally gotten a domestic distributor… of sorts.  It had been held in check despite taking home award after award at festival after festival, due to its Spanish-language ethnicity.  (Sometimes, I hate this business.)  But now the film is being taken on by the newest distributor of note, Film Movement.  Larry Meistrich’s baby, Film Movement picks up on the concept behind the late, lamented Shooting Gallery’s film series.  But instead of setting up a circuit of theaters, Film Movement will distribute by DVD.  It’s a daring idea… and you should be part of it.

Spellbound, which seemed to be every other person’s sleeper favorite at Toronto this year, has been picked up by THINKFilm.  Who’da thunk that a movie about the National Spelling Bee could be this fun?  THINKFilm is another great new boutique distributor, headed by Mark Urman  The film is scheduled for theatrical release in April… but I look forward to seeing it at the Mill Valley Film Festival where I will be next week. 

The Mill Valley Film Festival started last night with screenings of Frida and White Oleander.  Tonight, a tribute to Robin Wright-Penn.  I’ll be there next Friday for the tribute to Milos Forman and for a wide range of excellent panels.   Plus, movies, movies and more movies.  Mill Valley has found great movies from indie majors, tiny indies and true unknowns, creating an atmosphere of relaxed appreciation and enjoyment.  (Did I write that?  I need to get a job as a publicist!)  Anyway, I am looking forward to attending and, hopefully, seeing some of you there.  Friends of mine swear by the entire festival experience.  I’ll be writing while I am there.

Chris Gore’s “Who is the biggest ass writing about movies on the internet?” poll implodes by way of a bad Harry Knowles pun and the confusing (and popular) inclusion of Kevin Smith on the list.  I’d also like to thank the 28 people who voted for me, as of the writing of this column.  I’m in good company, with Patrick Sauriol, in the 20s.  You can still vote for your biggest ass at filmthreat.com.

Okay… let’s start at the top…

AIN’T IT SUPER?:   I am of two minds about the coverage car wreck at Ain’t It Cool regarding Superman.  One side of my brain wants to scream about the obvious flip-flopping, anus-exposing-bending-over, sucker-to-buy-the-spin absurdity of it all.  And the other side believes Harry and Drew (Moriarty) when they defend the evolution of their positions as a natural progression to which the rest of us are simply overreacting… even if I disagree with their rationalization.

My relationship with Ain’t It Cool has been pretty consistent, in terms of our differences.  I don’t care about Harry’s weight or haircut or his free trips or his position on the media food chain.  I care about what he prints… whether it is really honest… and how his high-profile actions affect the way the studios perceive the internet.  I also care about the corrosive effect of Ain’t It Cool and other rumor sites on traditional media, which allows its standards for entertainment coverage to be lowered because most editors don’t really think that entertainment reporting is real reporting. 

Ain’t It Cool has forever taken the position that they are not trying to be journalists.  They are a “fan based opinion site.” 

But here is the problem I have… besides all the journalistic perks that the site gets and often fights to get.  The same people who claim to have limited responsibility and a joyously anarchic structure also feel and act quite responsibly in many cases and make very specific choices about who benefits from their sense of anarchy.  The result, which has become increasingly true and increasingly obvious over the years, is that the site acts like a rich kid at college, joining the anarchy club at school and paying the dues with dad’s platinum American Express card. 

I believe the Ain’t It Coolers when they get frustrated trying to figure out why they are so often judged by the standards that they set out to transform.  Well, the reason is that they feed at the same trough as the rest of the media, but they act like they are in a private club.  They are the movie site equivalent of The Clinton White House. 

Was it criminal for Harry to write that he cried at Armageddon?  Of course not.  But the vast righteous wing conspirators simply wanted an acknowledgement that a free trip and special treatment may have softened up those tear ducts.

Was it criminal for Harry to change his mind about Godzilla?  Absolutely not!  But the wing was probably looking for a little self-awareness that circumstances can bend perspective.

(For the record, I believe that writing features about a movie and writing criticism is a dangerous combo.  It is the feature writer’s role to relate a subjective experience and it is a critic’s role to relate an objective experience.  Both roles can fairly cross over somewhat.  But being objective about the work of a friend -or a “media friend,” as BeBe Lerner calls them in Vanity Fair - is a brutal task… especially when you are going to expose your feelings to the public.)

Was it criminal for Ain’t It Cool to set itself up as the site with the best sources operating right under Lorenzo di Bonaventura’s nose when it came to casting Superman vs. Batman, but to miss the switch to Superman, which occurred slowly in Lorenzo’s office?  No.

Was it criminal for Moriarty to praise Jon Peters as the hero of the switch story for supporting the JJ Abrams Superman script and to shred the same script and project just days later after reading the script?  No.

Was it criminal for Harry to publish a link to a petition that was more extreme even than Moriarty’s position, but that Ain’t It Cool did not create?  No.

Was it criminal for Harry to publish the location of a JJ Abrams appearance in L.A. with a snickering suggestion that fans go to the event and give JJ a piece of their minds?  No.

Was it criminal for Harry to decide that the situation wasn’t so bad after talking to JJ, even though Harry still hadn’t read the script?  No.

Was it criminal for Harry to confirm his position about the project by reading the script and taking Moriarty to task for being less of a Superman geek and re-thinking the Donner Superman in the process?  No.

Was it criminal to push links to older stories about all of this further down the page and eventually off of the front page completely?  No.

But here’s the way it works when responsible writers and editors and publishers handle a story like this. 

1. They realize that you can’t get the horse back in the barn after you’ve set the barn on fire.   No one could ever object to Harry and Moriarty having different views of the JJ Abrams script.  (Not that I now believe in script reviews.)  But if you know that your lead reporter is going to go ballistic on a very high-profile project which has already been part of a process in which a studio head was fired, a lot of other people would be assigned to read that screenplay before a “This Screenplay Must Die” review went up. 

But it’s worse than that… Harry continued to start fires before he ever read the script.  As you can now see on their site, no links to a petition or a JJ Abrams appearance in L.A. next week.  Why?  Editorial judgment.  Editorial judgment that Harry was not using before he was called by JJ Abrams.

2. If your outlet takes it from behind from certain types of people in certain types of circumstances, the next time you bend over for the soap, people will be lining up.   Who am I to say that Harry was influenced unreasonably by JJ Abrams’ phone call, headlined as hours long?  There are quote whores who will earnestly tell you that they really do like every movie.  And maybe they do.  But when your website has a history of being brought under the tent by filmmakers and your readers realize that every film those filmmakers make seem to be better on your site, on average, than anyone else’s films, you have to understand how you got your rep. 

The frustrating thing for me about this problem is that I don’t think that Harry only likes these movies because his media friends are involved.  I think he is trying to be honest.  But when Rollerball turns out to be the only film that has brought you aboard in six years that you didn’t like, it’s hard to defend your integrity. 

Ain’t It Cool is hardly the only outlet that has built a love nest with certain filmmakers.  But they are the only website that argues viciously that the money on the nightstand really is “for something nice because he has to get to an appointment.”

3. Disclose, disclose, disclose…Again, Ain’t It Cool is hardly the only outlet guilty of undisclosed bias.  But they are one of the only outlets that claims the moral high ground and gets terribly offended if anyone suggests that they’ve strayed.  If you are really trying to be above the circus, you must disclose, disclose and disclose… disclose until you are embarrassed.  Of course, Harry knows that disclosure diminishes the value of a rave or an attack.  And he does do a significant amount of disclosure.  But not nearly enough to be taken seriously. 

Is Time Magazine mentioning that they got their Matrix exclusive because they are part of the Time-Warner family?  Does New Line’s Lord of the Rings trailer launch on AOL have a big banner disclosing that synergy is taking place?  Does ABC Family Channel announce that they are airing baseball playoff games because they retained the rights from the transition to Fox, but Fox would never allow those games to move to more competitive Disney properties like ESPN or ABC?  No… none of the above.  But I see those three situations as less and less significant.  Time Magazine is no longer respected as it once was because each year, news gives way to more and more features.  A one day delay on seeing a trailer is negligible… it’s not as though they said, “You can only see it on AOL this month or you can pay to see it only with WB and NL movies that you have paid to see at a theater.”   And the machinations of broadcast rights… yawn.

Ain’t It Cool’s work with Rules of Attraction and the Roger Avary/ QT connection really doesn’t bother me.  It’s inside baseball.  But in the case of Superman, the project was wounded by the Moriarty review… even if they could go ahead and make the movie and 10,000 people would be thinking about what Ain’t It Cool said at this stage and every one of them would be seeing the film regardless.  If Harry is 100% sincere, then he allowed his site to be used recklessly and acted irresponsibly.  If Harry is bending because he is engaged by celebrity, then he is a whore.  I’m still trying to find a better answer to the question.  But the truth is, I don’t think that my idea of reckless irresponsibility bothers the Ain’t It Cool gang very much. 

The sad part is that Ain’t It Cool is well-intended and generally does good works.  But these are the moments that define us… any of us… as pundits, critics, journalists, fans and human beings.  These moments come just a few times for each of us each year… pass or fail… stand-up or bend over… unanimity of opinion is not an option.  But what always worries me when one of these little web tsunamis blows over is that I tend to get the feeling that the lesson that Harry – and to a much lesser degree, Drew/Moriarty – takes away is not to do better next time, but that any of us who dare to criticize them are just petty, jealous assholes.  Like I said… unanimity of opinion is not an option.

 

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