Yesterday was one of those Loudon Wainwright III mornings when I could’ve read the Sunday Times until Tuesday and still not finished. So much interesting stuff. They had a front-page article on Obama as constitutional law school professor and how that might impact his Souter decision; a great Q&A with Pres. Obama on just about every topic under the sun; a review, by Thomas Mallon, of Christopher Buckley’s book on his parents, which feels like my take on it from the excerpt in the magazine last Sunday; an article on life in Holland (“Going Dutch”) that I haven't even gotten to yet; and then some movie goodies.  

There’s a summer movie preview (more and more meaningless these days); a Q&A with Cannes-bound Quentin Tarantino in which, among other things, the director talks up “Superman Returns” (I so want to read that piece he’s writing, and I'd love to link the Q&A, but, via their site, I can't find it); a great, fun photo-shoot between QT and new femme star Diane Kruger (right, the face that launched a thousand CGI ships in “Troy”); and, most interesting of all, “Memos to Hollywood,” which includes some quick e-mail notes from Times heavyweight critics A.O. Scott and Manohla Dargis to the heavyweights of Hollywood. Some of the memos, yes, feel easy pickings, some I disagree with (“kill the Oscars”), while Ms. Dargis can be a bit of a scold. But most of the time I felt like Mrs. Bloom: Yes, yes, yes!

• A.O. Scott on animated movies: “Enough with the winking, tiresome pop-culture allusions... Try telling a simple story with conviction. The merchandising tie-ins will take care of themselves.”
• Manohla Dargis on digitial filmmaking: When it was first introduced, the process seemed as if it might expand the cinematographers’ toolbox. But because of their ease of use, those same tools are being usurped by studio executives, producers, directors and even actors who all want a say in how to digitally “fix” the image.
• A.O. Scott: You all keep trying to make Rock Hudson-Doris Day-style romantic comedies with the golden guys and gals of the moment, and the results are sexless, subtextless, bland career-girl-in-search-of-Mr.-Right retreads...
• Manhola Dargis: Audiences complain that there’s nothing to watch, and that may be true if you live near a multiplex that plays only the latest in schlock entertainment. But if you live in a city like New York or Los Angeles, you have no business whining. New York in particular is a cinephile’s dream, and there’s almost always something shaking up the screen at Film Forum, the IFC Center, the Walter Reade Theater, Anthology Film Archives and BAMcinématek...

Read it all. Me, I’m going back to “Going Dutch”...

Posted at 08:59 AM on Mon. May 04, 2009 in category Movies, Media  

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