November 7, 2003

In the real world, the director and the actor often switch roles. We are used to the notion of the flamboyant actor drawing us in, while the brilliant director stays behind the camera, orchestrating the dance, often not even thought about by moviegoers. Yet in real life, the director is often the storytelling extrovert and the actor is often the thoughtful introvert.

The though occurs to me after sitting down with director Nigel Cole and actress Julie Walters. I’m not sure I ever sat down with a director and an actor at the same time before. And though the conversation was terrific fun, I was reminded why. Talking to an actor and talking to a director can exercise quite a different series of muscles.

Nigel had the surprising feel of the big brother I never had. He’s sharp. He likes playing with words. And he likes to tell a good story. He was also exhausted, up most of the night with his 14-month-old who just arrived yesterday and is, apparently, still on England time.

Normally, I give directors a lot of conversational room. But somehow, with Nigel, I didn’t. I realize quickly that each time I try to tell a story, I’m not connecting completely. Perhaps it’s because I am a big talker… and I am. Don’t get me wrong. Nigel was open and engaged, leading the conversation from the start. But he might have enjoyed it more if I had just shut up and enjoyed his storytelling.

Julie, on the other hand, mentions that she is a bit of a chatterbox when we talk about her role as a somewhat restrained widow in Calendar Girls going against type in the film. Yet, she can barely get a word in edgewise in this group. She, too, is exhausted, just one night of bad sleep after the flight from home.

But there is something unexpected about this woman, old enough to be my older sister (literally), that kind of makes you feel like going shopping with her would be fun… having lunch… taking in a movie. The thought of “putting up” with her chatter seems like a pleasant option, since she seems open to the world in a really lovely way.

There is something about non-Americans, I must admit. There is something about the stakes of Hollywood filmmaking that drives people to distraction, whether they are dealing with success or failure. Cole is clearly serious about the work, but he has the Brit director thing where the work is work and doesn’t pretend to be something else. Walters smiles with quiet delight each time she talks about the work.

Calendar Girls has the feel of a pick-up, but Disney was in from the beginning. Cole will make his next film for the Mouse House too. There was, he tells me, very little creative interference from the studio, which was in part because the budget was so small. The closest they apparently came to tension was when the details of the actresses’ breasts became the subject of negotiation as they chased the PG-13.

The film is well into profit already, achieving one of the highest grosses in England for a British made film ever. The appeal of the film outside of the U.K. was expected, as the true story of the calendar girls has gotten a lot more play, it seems, away from home. Nigel related a story about one of the real calendar girls visiting L.A. this year and being recognized from her 2000 Jay Leno appearance.

Both Julie Walters and Helen Mirren play against type in the film… kind of. Both characters are strong women, for which these two are known. But here, Walters is the stoic and Mirren is the ditz. But as Cole pointed out, each brings their other nature to their role, giving a broader feel to roles that he feared could turn deadly cheesy.

In The Oscar Season Of Death, the comedic Calendar Girls is a member of the family. The central story is driven by the death of a character. One of the more interesting elements of the film is that the film doesn’t try to make that sad side of the story go away. It remains and it does have its own arc.

Cole and Waters and their band of merry ladies will surely find some love this holiday season, especially from the Academy age group, which will be able to relate to the experiences of the calendar girls.

REVOLUTIONS: Box office is a funny thing. Listen to all the Matrix bashers avoid saying that their readers are stupid, while saying that their interest in this movie is some kind of marketing trick. Only 12 movies in history have had $24 million or higher opening days. Interestingly, the two least successful of these films bookend The Matrix Revolutions opening yesterday – The Hulk and Planet of The Apes, which ended up with $132 million and $180 million domestic, respectively. On the other hand, the only openings this big outside of summer were the Harry Potters and LOTR: The Two Towers (Fellowship started with $6 million less on day one).

A 50% drop to $12 million on Thursday (yesterday) should be understood to be a show of strength. Likewise, a $55 million 3-day weekend, which would take the 5-day total to just over $90 million, should be considered a win for the film. Of course, even if the film breaks the $100 million mark in 5 days, bashers will point to the film doing less business than Reloaded. Anything over $58 million would still be the second biggest R-rated opening 3-day ever, even though Revolutions is slowed by the Wednesday open, unlike current #2 Hannibal and current #3, 8 Mile

The biggest question of the weekend is not likely to be the success of Revolutions, however, but just how much Elf can do in the vacuum of the Neo nation.

READER OF THE DAY: ON TAP writes: “I despised Reloaded. I'm right there on the front lines of the argument that it was a pompous load of over-written dialogue, done to mask the reality that what was being said was not nearly as deep, profound and complex as fans of the film claimed.

I was certain I would hate Revolutions too, but in fact I enjoyed it, though it isn't nearly as good as the first film.

I imagine me seeing and liking Revolutions was like a Phantom Menace hater seeing Attack Of The Clones and liking it. A lot of the elements that were so bad in the previous film were still present, but were thankfully scaled back(pretentious dialogue being this trilogy's Jar Jar Binks). Characters did not blather on and on this time, and THANK GOD there were no grand Morpheus speeches. And no rave orgies. And not quite as much gratuitous slo-mo. And fewer council meetings. You get the idea.

This film doesn't have many ideas floating around, but as an action film it works. The Zion battle sequence, for sheer scope and epicness, has arguably no equal. I'd buy the DVD just for that part of the film. It was exciting. It was dramatic, and unlike Reloaded's action, it actually mattered.

In fact, it kind of masks how most of the other action bits here weren't that great. The fights inside the matrix were very boring. I'm tired of seeing people jump and flip all over the place w/o gravity. And I found the Neo-Smith fight to be really quite awful. Were they doing a ballet dance or something? I found no drama in seeing 2 nearly invincible beings slam around in the rain.

There were other problems I had, but I liked a lot of the film too. There were nice human moments. There were several generous shots of Monica Bellucci's cleavage. And really, isn't that the most important thing?”

FITTIN’ IN writes: “How could there be any bile spewing over the Matrix Revolutions? The movie is such a "ho-hum" that no human or computer program could get hot and bothered over its lassitude.

Call me crazy, but wasn't the Zion humans' motivation in the first Matrix to FREE all their enslaved brothers and sisters from the machines? While at the end of Revolutions, they're just happy that its ended in a tie? These Zion ravers must have loved Vietnam.

Well at least it was an educational film. Now I know that if my body and mind are taken over by some evil machines, my fellow human beings will be fine with it, as long as the machines aren't trying to kill them... and besides some of the machines are okay. Thanks a lot, fuckers.”

ROGER HEALEY’S PAL writes: “All of that being said, I think the debates over the specifics of the films are somewhat moot in that no other film(s) come to mind for which peoples' reactions are inevitably infected with rampant, inflated expectations. There is hardly a review I have read that doesn't somehow mention the reviewer's own notions of where he/she thought the Wachowski's were taking the trilogy, where it actually ended up, and how that discrepancy fuels the "critical" disappointment of the reviewer. I feel that Reloaded landed with such a dull thud for so many people because there were four years of hypothesizing and extrapolating the possibilities left open at the end of one of the most beloved, iconic, pop-culture events that was the first film. Everyone committed to the journey of the first one immediately because there were no expectations, no pre-conceived notions (except maybe that of "man, I hope this is better than Johnny Mnemonic").

Reloaded represented a very singular and epic brainchild meticulously and laboriously crafted by the Wachowskis. They may not be on the level of the most consistently solid screenwriters/storytellers, but as conceptual visionaries, I think all movie fans owe them a great deal for pushing the envelope in terms of what level of thought-provocation we can (and should) expect from action blockbusters. As soon as the Wachowski's visions veered from a person's own cherished, singular vision of how the movies would end up, bubbles were burst and the floodgates of negativity were opened.

Even the few months between Reloaded and Revolutions proved enough time to create a flurry of wild theories postulated by those who were able to set aside their own biases and once again, take the roller coaster ride with the Wachowskis' regardless of a few bumps on the ascent. Matrix within a matrix? Trinity is actually The One? Merovignian is a previous version of

The One? The bum from the restaurant is a previous version of The One? Persephone is the mother of the matrix? The Architect is telling the truth? He's lying? On and on and on (without any mention of the philosophical explorations presented) and I do not say that with disdain as I think the amount of sheer thought generated by these films is incredible. But once

again, the Wachowski's stepped up and delivered yet another singular, unpredictable, and meticulously crafted vision to complete their trilogy.

SPOILER AHEAD. No one could have predicted the Train Man. No one thought for a second that the Merovignian (or Smith, or Neo for that matter) is relatively inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. Are questions raised by the second film left unanswered? Yes. But in citing that as a flaw, people are completely glossing over what was actually presented in the

movie and focusing more on what was not. I think, amazingly, Harry Knowles' review delineates this nicely, as well as the countless possibilities offered by the dense subtext combined with the fact that it is not the filmmaker's responsibility to spoon feed the audience and leave everything resolved and defined in nice, easy to swallow, compartmentalized tidbits.

So, ultimately, I believe the dividing line between the Matrix-lovers and the Matrix-haters lies between the realm of those who are willing to hand themselves over to the Wachowski's vision and those who still cling to their own directorial notes. Those who commit to understanding what they are presented instead of looking for everything that was not will be rewarded with a truly engaging experience. Yes, the philosophizing borders on pretentious at times, but when has pretension NOT been an essential component of philosophy? And why should we be so hopeless bound to the conventions of each of the genres that the Wachowki's amalgamate? What we have been given is one of the most amazing realized sci-fi/action/kung-fu/war epic head trips of a blockbuster. The money is undoubtedly on the screen and there is no George Lucas, Roland Emmerich, or

even Brian Singer PG-13 pandering. This is Spielberg, Kubrick, H.G. Wells, and Sartre all wrapped up into one. When the fight for Zion was in full gear, for the first time in my 24 years, I felt like I knew what it must have been like to see 2001 or Star Wars for the first time in the theater must have been like.

On one had, I don't think anything could recreate the "GODDAMN" experience of seeing Neo waking up in the pod in the first Matrix, but as far as large scale epic action that I have NEVER seen the likes of, Revolutions takes the cake. The sheer weight and tension of every scene knowing that the last humans on earth could die at any moment is enough weight on its own, but they take it one step further by weaving in the groundwork for endless hours of discussion on religion, theology, the meaning of life, global political inner workings, etc. etc. etc. Was it how I would have done it? Probably not, but that's ok, because how they did it was fucking brilliant enough for me.”

E ME: Long weekend ahead… bring it on…