That darned John Boyega is making a fair living off of derivative/repetitive sci-fi sequels. Scott Eastwood needs to show he’s more than just a magic surname.
And Charlie Day? He could use the money.
“Pacific Rim Uprising” is a sequel dictated by the shifting axis of world box office clout, from the US/Europe to China/Asia.
Pan-national casts, big dumb action-bot movies that don’t require a lot of dialogue, subtitled or otherwise. Look for this one March 23.
The best line in Eddie Izzard’s stultifying new autobiography, “Believe Me,” comes in the forward. And the British transgender comic attributes it to one of his idols, the Scots comic Billy Connolly.
Billy’s rule for a life in showbiz, or just life in general? Keep yourself “windswept and interesting.” Eddie says he’s taken this to heart.
So he isn’t just a transvestite, he’s “an ACTION transvestite,” running marathons for assorted charities around the world, performing his stand-up act in every country that will have him. He ran 27 of these 26 mile endurance races in South Africa not that long ago.
He isn’t just a stand-up comic, he’s a comic who sometimes performs in a dress (as if that’s rare in the UK).
But “Believe Me,” which was inspired by a 2009 autobiographical documentary with half that title (“Believe”) is a crushing bore.
Watch his stand-up specials or samples of them on Youtube and you’ve had his warning shot. He’s better at putting over his material — sometimes in drag, because while he loves women, he loves their clothes and makeup and nail polish, too — than he is at coming up with funny, original comedy.
How he won an Emmy for “writing” his first HBO special (“Dressed to Kill”) would be a mystery, if not for the Emmy voters’ Anglophilia and willingness to grab hold of the hot new “novelty act.”
He confesses as much in the book, which tests one’s patience, right from the get-go. How long do you typically give a memoir to “get to the good stuff?” I’m not that interested in his discovery of his sexuality (very young) or his coming out (drama free, pretty much). I am curious how he went from being a star street performer and Edinburgh Fringe breakout to a stand-up and then film star.
He charts that rise, never once using the word “chutzpah” for the cocky confidence that drove him to book theaters before he was well-established, and basically will himself to success. But he also leaves out jokes that made his early mark, descriptions of the routines that drew crowds on the street (his manic patter comes from that) or his breaks in film.
I loved his work in “The Cat’s Meow,” “Across the Universe” and the new period piece import, “Victoria and Abdul.” I interviewed him a few years back about another film appearance, and found him amusing and charming. He doesn’t address any specifics about his rise so much as name-drop how stunned he is that a lad who didn’t even get into Cambridge (and its Footlights comedy fame pipeline) could share the screen with the likes of Judi Dench, who sends him a banana before every opening night.
He was a phenomenon in Britain, and that led to New York fame, and US tours. But there’s just nothing here to explain it. He dismisses the idea that doing his act in drag added novelty, and unique subject matter for his routines, even though surely that’s part of it.
He lost his mother while quite young, and thinks he’s still trying to please her, he figures. Not the first to claim that ground, but there it is. The footnotes to the writing — some laborious, some witty — are more telling than recounting his sporting life, love life (demure in the extreme, in his telling) and professional accomplishments, rising above his comfortable middle class upbringing to stardom.
There’s a disarming “It Gets Better” subtext here as he recounts facing down (with extreme politeness) most of those gay bashers he has encountered on the street over the years.
But if you’re not looking for that sort of affirmation, the entertainment value and “Here’s how I did it” revelations of “Believe Me” are sorely lacking.
I’ll bet Lady Gaga’s fans never realized just how much their iconic tiny dynamo has in common with the late Jerry Lewis.
Lewis injured himself, just as his fame was cresting in the mid-1960s, by pulling a slide-across-the-piano pratfall on his TV show. He lived with chronic back pain the rest of his life — wheelchairs, injections and finally managed that pain when a medicine pump was installed to keep that pain from reaching his brain. This was after decades of trooping on, in the grand showbiz tradition, playing through that pain.
Gaga (born Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta) broke her hip five years ago. And ever since, it’s been injections, exotic “cupping” treatments, massages, electro-therapy — all to lesson the pain of fibramyalgia.
That’s the big take-away from the tiny dancer’s new Netflix documentary, “Gaga: Five foot Two.” We see her creating, recording, prepping for the 2016 Super Bowl halftime show.
She’s all here, over 30 and out in the open, in and out of makeup, hugging fans and family, in various states of attire — generally as little as possible. She seems to relish the shock value of toplessness — while she still can pull it off.
The towering talent and huge voice shine through, as does the short, insecure-in-her-looks pop icon, captured in between boyfriends and fretting and weeping that she’ll never have another. Whatever contemporaries Taylor Swift and Katy Perry and Rihanna have going for them in the dating game, the most-over-the-top-of-them-all is starting to wonder if her fame, her tendency to show way too much skin and put on larger than life spectaculars that dwarf her humanity might scare any man who isn’t a gold digger away.
See her trash-talk Madonna (who insulted the derivative nature of her persona), thrash out the songs that became the “Joanne” album, prep for the Super Bowl and do media appearances in support of it.
Watch her (clumsily, at times) drive the ’60s Lincoln convertible, the 1970 or so Ford Bronco, the 1980 Mercedes — restored vehicles from her family’s history.
See her weep with genuine concern over sick friends and relatives, but somehow make it about her “losing” someone as karmic payback for her every success.
Her more stripped-down shows — an appearance for candidate Hillary Clinton, for instance — seem to point to where her career should go. Let the talent and not the titillation carry her forward. But even as she cancels legs of her rigorous, gimmicky tours, she fights this future. She has “underboob” to invent and new frontiers in shorter-shortest shorts to explore.
It’s not a great documentary, and considering how many of these she has released, it’s not a particularly revealing one — outside of her efforts (doctor’s visits, treatments) to deal with this ongoing pain.
But the Lady is a trouper. Let’s hope she finds some relief and maybe abandons the whole camel-toe/daily dye job fashion thing before she turns into Cher, way before her time.
MPAA Rating: unrated, nudity, profanity, smoking
Cast: Lady Gaga (Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta) Florence Welch, Mark Ronson, her family, producers and entourage
Credits:Directed by Chris Moukarbel. A Netflix release.
Running time: 1:40
Looks kind of like Ryan Gosling walking through an empty movie theater, doesn’t it?
Some people are using the “B” word to describe “Blade Runner 2049” and its “Maybe it’ll clear $50,” “Whoops it’ll be lucky to reach $40” and “Uh oh, it better clear $30” opening weekend. A 40% drop in expectations is disastrous, as it means the picture won’t clear $80 in the U.S.
Fanboys and fangirls are a fickle bunch, and the sci-fi crowd has already been burned by a lavishly over-praised “Alien” prequel this year. Were they wary? Distracted? Or are they grossly exaggerated in their influence and enthusiasm or, um, sophistication?
Building a picture that lacks much in the line of humanity, zero urgency and a main villain (Jared Leto) who serves no purpose — and tucking all that into a lovely two and a half hour stroll through a dystopian future that seems all but assured since the last election isn’t paying off. The breathless reviews are ALL based on its look. Not so much the tone, performances and connection with the audience. I see it as a top 15 film, not a top ten one.
Let’s leave it at that. It could hang around and do “Arrival” numbers, all-in.
Is Ryan Gosling Big Box Office? Not yet.
“The Mountain Between Us” survived a fate worse than box office death, losing its opening weekend to a “My Little Pony” niche (tiny tots, and Pony perverts) animated pic. “Mountain” did $10 million. Kate Winslet hasn’t worked enough in recent years — not as a leading lady — to make her a safe bet to open a picture. Idris Elba is doing a lot of films, none of which are very good. He’s a movie star, not a box office star. James Bond was his best bet to change that, and that probably won’t happen as he’s ageing out of that window.
High per screen numbers for “The Florida Project,” which won’t open in Florida and the rest of “flyover country” until next weekend.
The reviews have been of the swooning variety, despite the obvious shortcomings “Blade Runner 2049” has as…a MOVIE. Chilly, inhuman, all the empathy of an iPad.
Then there’s the fact that it is a long long LONG delayed sequel to an iconic but cult-ish film from the early 1980s.
But the $45-50 million opening weekend predicted seemed like a given. Not any more. A robust Thursday gave way to a more modest Friday, and Deadline.com is shoving its projections down to $36 million.
That’s an “Alien: Prometheus” sized take.
Wow.
It is wiping “It” off the map and sucking up all the BO oxygen. But “My Little Pony” is clearing $11 million, and “The Mountain Between Us” is bombing (as expected) at under $10.
“American Made” and “Kingsman” are still neck and neck (with “Kingsman: The Golden Circle” having come out a week before and thus toting a much heavier purse), “Victoria and Abdul” is healthily inside the top ten, as is “Battle of the Sexes.”
The locally-filmed “The Florida Project” is winning the per-screen race, on just four theaters and piling up the cash. It opens wider next weekend.
Another darkly-comic tale of the seedy side from the creators of “Nightcrawler.” Denzel Washington plays a once-heroic activist lawyer still stuck in the ’70s — his clothes, his attitudes, his interaction with a “Not hearing you, Black Man” legal system.
And then he loses his gig and his moral compass. Colin Farrell co-stars in this November dramedy — more dramatic than funny, think “The Night Of.”
Every other potential moneymaker from October moved off this weekend. Because everybody knows that 30 year gap sequel or not, “Blade Runner 2049” is a brand that’s going to suck all of the oxygen and cash out of the box office this weekend.
“The Mountain Between Us” is basically a sacrificial lamb led to the slaughter — $10-12 million for the Idris Elba/Kate Winslet weeper.
Will “2049” clear $50 million? Box Office Mojo seems to think so.
The Box Office Guru figures “2049” will earn $49 on its opening weekend.
Based on Thursday night’s numbers ($4 million), it should be in the $45 million range. Word of mouth may bump it up, or suppress it. As I said in my review, it does tend to lack a character we can wholly empathize with, a beating heart — emotion.
In any event, Warners’ film will supplant Warners’ “It” as the big movie of the weekend and should give it a run for biggest blockbuster of the fall. “American Made” should top “Kingsman” and maybe even “It,” as it has most of the week.
Here’s a documentary that lays out a relentlessly discouraging parade of statistics — 40% of food raised is wasted, 1.4 million tons of food wasted in the U.S. every year, 24 million slices of bread tossed out in the U.K. every DAY. And then it hits us with story after upbeat story of waste bread being recycled into beer in Europe, of a composting, gardening elementary school in New Orleans’ 13th Ward — of Italy, France and South Korea keeping food waste from going into landfills.
But for all the advocacy of “Wasted! The Story of Food Waste,” its grim depictions of worldwide deforestation to aid food production, food that then all-too-often goes unharvested, or into the dumpster behind your supermarket or into the garbage at you home, your kid’s school or your favorite restaurant, it’s what is done with the food that doesn’t go to waste that gets our attention.
We see chefs in the U.S. figuring out what to do with cauliflower leaves (the biggest part of the plant), with “trash fish” caught in the worldwide trawling of the oceans and Japanese farmers learning to be selective about which re-purposed dietary garbage to feed their pigs to get the most succulent pork on Earth.
Narrator Anthony Bourdain and assorted activists, authors and journalists lament the $1500 the average America family wastes from its fridge, table or pantry every year, the laughable finality of “use by” dates (more a suggestion, in the case of dried, frozen, bottled or canned foods).
The guy who used to run Trader Joe’s shows off Daily Table, his non-profit inner city market where good but discarded or discounted food is sold in the middle of a food desert.
And the salty-tongued Bourdain (“Kitchen Confidential” and TV’s “Parts Unknown”) and equally salty pal Mario Batali, and other chefs make profane wisecracks about turning this or that discarded or lightly regarded edible item into a delicacy through deceptive naming, mere exposure of the public to the something we, “the dumba–es in the dining room,” should be eating but turn up our noses at.
Seriously, for a movie about garbage, “Wasted!” (Anna Chai and Nari Kye co-directed it) is awfully appetizing. Porgy (fish) and squash stalks never looked so yummy. And Toast Ale? Made from bread Brits and others aren’t getting around to sandwiching? Got to have it.
So if you are throwing it out when that veg or fruit just has a spot on it, stop. Not composting? Get on that. (Ask me about the papaya and avocado trees I have raised from composted seeds.)
And want to fight global warming? Stop dumping methane-producing spoiled produce into the trash can.
And see this movie. Batali gives the always-delightful Bourdain (who felt compelled to do a self-loathing rant over the closing credits) a run for his foul-mouthed money in the acerbic, poetic and pungent ways of commenting on food and what we should be doing to make sure we always have enough of it to feed everybody. Stop wasting it, for starters.
MPAA Rating: unrated, with profanity
Cast: Anthony Bourdain, Mario Batali, Mark Bittman, others.
Credits: Directed by Anna Chai, Nari Kye A Zero Point Zero release.
Running time: 1:25
Good to see Juno Temple escaping the trap that indie cinema has put her in (hookers, fallen women). Or, maybe she isn’t. Never mind.
Kate Winslet, Jim Belushi and Justin Timberlake star in what looks to be a gangsterish period piece about habitues of New York’s famous amusement park in, oh, the late ’40s. The last time Woody went out and heard real people speaking real sentences, and not this Tennessee Williams English that has cursed his pictures in his dotage, in other words.
“Wonder Wheel,” taking its name from a Ferris Wheel, makes for a good looking trailer, as always, so we are intrigued. Kate could use a break after the death of “Mountain Between Us,” which hasn’t actually died but will come this weekend. And die.
JT? A boyish lifeguard? Hmm. At least he’s not hanging around with Andy Samberg.
If you got all your crime news from the movies, you’d probably wonder how any of us survive the mass murdering drug cartels, avoid becoming a serial killer’s prey or protect our teenage girls from being abducted into sexual slavery.
Human trafficking is both a Hollywood cause and a horrific yet titillating subject for a thriller. Somebody’s going to be “Taken,” where this “Priceless” child will end up in the “Trade.” Half a dozen movies on this theme come out every year.
Little separates “Trafficked,” a low-budget entry in the field, from the pack, save for the presence of some big names in supporting roles in the cast. It’s an ambitious, multi-national peek at the different paths young women from Nigeria, India and California find themselves trapped in a brothel in Texas.
Mali (Jessica Obilum) tells how her mother compared prostitution to farming — “A man” must be endured for a few minutes, whereas “planting sweet potatoes takes all day, in the burning sun.”
Amba (Alpa Banker) and her pal are comparing notes about the colleges in America that are getting them out of New Delhi . Children of affluence, they cross the wrong punk, are assaulted and Amba finds herself drugged and dragged across the world.
“Two planes, three trucks, one speedboat and one wooden rowboat” later, she’s stuck “owing” the creep in charge, Simon (Sean Patrick Flanery) “500 men” before she’ll be let go.
Anne Archer plays the nun running a group home for orphans in rural California, where Sara (Kelly Washington) is celebrating her 18th birthday. A helpful social worker (Ashley Judd) is there for the party, and to whisk Sara away to a life working on cruise ships. Not really.
All three endure beatings and witness murders on their journeys, but are wholly reassured when one and all comfort them with “It’s just business, honey.” Each is treated like chattel, man-handled, brutalized and killed if they don’t heed the threats.
There is no bystander who will see their plight and rescue them, no relative tracking them down, no help from corrupt border country law enforcement (Patrick Duffy plays the Texas Rangers honcho totally in on the scam).
Mali counsels “Don’t think about who you used to be…You lie back and survive.”
But with drug cartels partnered in an unholy girls for guns for drugs triangle trade, even the youngest among them has to know that promises of release are empty. They either escape or die.
The script is by Siddharth Kara, a Harvard academic who is Director of the Program on Human Trafficking and Modern Slavery at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. So whatever the screenplay lacks in originality, suspense or action beat plausibility, it has that “This sort of thing really happens” authority about it.
The rarer than rare good lines are given to the most interesting of the victims, Mali.
Actor turned producer and now director Will Wallace didn’t get lessons on pacing, or learned the wrong lessons from the likes of Terrence Malick, whom he’s worked with. The plot, for all its tried and true conventions, has eye-rolling leaps in logic and sort of lumbers between star cameos until we reach a far-fetched if generic conclusion.
All manner of well-intentioned pictures are being made on this awful subject, faith-based movies to simple Liam Neeson thrillers. But whatever its worthiness as a cause worth wiping out, you’ve got to bring something new to the table to make your movie stand out. And casting Anne Archer as a nun, Ashley Judd and Patrick Duffy as villains and Efren Ramirez of “Napoleon Dynamite” as a sympathetic Gypsy bartender in the brothel isn’t it.
MPAA Rating: R for disturbing violent content including sexual assaults, language, and some drug use
Cast: Kelly Washington, Jessica Obilum, Alpa Banker, Ashley Judd, Anne Archer, Patrick Duffy
Credits: Directed by Will Wallace, script by Siddharth Kara. An Epic release.
Running time: 1:39
Movie Nation 