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THURS MORNING UPDATE: “Sound of Freedom” narrowly beat “Mission Impossible” last night and took the top position at this morning’s box office. Technically. It’s time for an audit to figure out what went on here.
Also, this morning star Jim Caviezel called Trump “a new Moses” this morning on Fox and Fiends.
WEDNESDAYNIGHT: “Sound of Freedom” will cross the $100 million mark tonight. But it gets an asterisk. “SOF” is crowdfunded by Angel Studios. They’ve had millions of tickets purchased in blocks so audience members can go for free. No one knows who bought the tickets or how many people actually used them.
What happens if the free tickets donated by church and Christian groups aren’t used?
According to Angel Studios’ website:
“If there are any funds remaining after the theatrical run, they will be used to pay for streaming Sound of Freedom in the Angel Studios app. Remaining funds from Pay it Forward may also be used to help the filmmaker create additional content.”
So that should disabuse everyone about where the money is going. Because of this, the “Sound of Freedom” is just ka ching, but not the sound of truth.
A quick look tonight at Fandango in Chicago, Kansas City, and Indianapolis — places where “SOF” would have an audience — shows lots of seats available at all times. This would negate the proposition that it’s selling out like crazy. In all likelihood, Angel Studios sitting on plenty of tickets that haven’t been used.
Fandango and the other ticket systems would be wise to perform an audit.
They’ve sent Aldean’s racist song, “Try That in a Small Town” to the top of the iTunes singles charts. It doesn’t matter to them that the song is intended to incite violence against anyone who comes into a “small town” (meaning all white) and messes with “good ol boys.”
In their zeal to be part of this stupidity the fans have also sent an Aldean album to number 3 on iTunes. The only problem is, it’s the wrong album but has a similar title. “Rearview Town,” does not include the song. It came out in 2018 and has nothing to do with the newer more controversial screed.
Aldean has been denounced by Sheryl Crow. CMT has pulled the video, although it’s still easy to find on YouTube. Capitol Records Nashville should cut off sales of that record, but record companies exert little editorial judgement when it comes to records if they’re selling well. (Spotify and Apple should, too.) Sir Lucian Grainge has the ultimate authority over Capitol. It’s up to him to say enough is enough. But Universal Music Group did little to punish Morgan Wallen when he used the ‘n’ word in a home video. Since then he’s sold millions and millions of albums.
There’s a lot to unpack in Christopher Nolan’s three hour masterwork, “Oppenheimer.” This is ostensibly the story of how America created the atomic bomb and a legacy of pending nuclear war starting in the 1940s and looming over us today.
It’s also a cautionary tale of how this country creates heroes and tries to destroy them all at the same time. “E Pluribus Unum” should really be replaced as our motto by “No good deed goes unpunished.”
For Nolan, “Oppenheimer” is a career high after two decades worth of innovative, intriguing filmmaking. All his sensational turns and rearranging of time have led to this moment. Forget “Barbenheimer.” This should be “Operaheimer.”
Cillian Murphy and Emily Blunt, who have immense chemistry, reunite from “A Quiet Place Part 2” as J Robert Oppenheimer and his his difficult wife, Kitty. She may be overwrought because he’s a distracted, emotionally distant womanizer (as described by others in the film) who’s got a quirky mistress (Florence Pugh) with a Communist past. (Here are Nolan’s first ever sex scenes.) Oppenheimer’s brother is also enamored of the American Communist party. But J Robert resists. Science is his focus. But, of course, the Communist associations will come back to bite him.
With these characters set up, Nolan begins mixing in the exceptional supporting cast beginning with Robert Downey Jr as Lewis Strauss (pronounced Stras, he says) head of the Atomic Energy Commission. Because Downey has been playing Iron Man for a generation no one recalls his Oscar nomination for playing Charlie Chaplin. But Downey is more than up to the challenge with the duplicitous Strauss, whose neck veins are always on the verge of exploding as he navigates his own Washington career at the expense of Oppenheimer. This is Downey’s performance of a lifetime.
There are plenty of other talented people doing exceptional work including Matt Damon, Josh Hartnett, David Krumholtz, Jason Clarke, Tony Goldwyn, Alden Ehrenreich, Kenneth Branagh, Macon Blair, and, inevitably, Gary Oldman as a surprise Harry Truman. Matthias Schweighöfer pops off the screen as German physicist Werner Heisenberg. Rami Malek and Casey Affleck each steal their respective scenes. Matthew Modine brings profoundly weary gravity to his moments. Nolan has rounded up the best people for this ensemble.
The other major player here aside from all these people is composer Ludwig Goransson. As a friend of mine said, this movie scored from wall-to-wall. There is rarely a moment without music underneath the dialogue or soaring through scenes of cosmic explosions. So many scenes are a lot of talk, the delivery of information, that the music is the apple sauce that makes the pill go down. The characters are almost singing the lyrics of how to build a better bomb. It helps that editor Jennifer Lame is cutting to the music, establishing a rhythm like it’s in a top 40 hit. You can almost snap your fingers to her work.
Nolan does play with time. but far more efficiently than in some of his previous more frustrating outings. It’s almost like he picked up a cue from Steven Soderberg. The different time lines are color coded and east to keep track of. This is especially helpful since two of the colliding plots are centered on hearings taking place in small rooms at conference tables. Yet they are distinct and build to dramatic counterpoints.
In the end, though, Nolan has constructed a compelling drama about a man upon whom the world’s fate rests. And when he succeeds at his mission, Oppenheimer is eventually punished for realizing the power of his invention. You’d think the highlight of a movie about the atomic bomb would be the actual explosion. But the mushroom cloud Nolan sets off is really after the climax, as the denouement of the film is almost more gripping because Oppenheimer has been so effectively presented as sympathetic but flawed.
We haven’t had a ‘big’ Best Picture in many years. The trend has been to quieter stuff, like “Nomadland,” “Spotlight,” “Moonllght,” etc. Nolan has the audacity here to address history writ large and ponder the universe, our place in it, and how decisions from 80 years ago have affected our present and future. A lot of people who see “Oppenheimer” may be shocked to discover all this really happened. But it really did, and we have this document to memorialize it.
If you didn’t hate Mel Gibson before, now’s a good time to join in.
Gibson and Lions Gate have gotten a waiver from SAG AFTRA to make a new movie despite two ongoing union strikes.
Gibson, the noted antisemite, racist, and misogynist, will direct “Flight Risk” starring that other man of the people, Mark Wahlberg.
“Flight Risk” sounds a like very important movie. It’s another formula piece of junk with this through line: “An Air Marshal transporting a fugitive across the Alaskan wilderness via a small plane finds herself trapped when she suspects their pilot is not who he says he is.”
Lions Gate is the already signed on distributor. No one has ever accused them of integrity. The production company is Gibson’s Icon.
It will be interesting to see which other actors sign on for this production.
Gibson and Wahlberg previously collaborated on “Father Stu,” which made just $21 million was a disaster. Gibson has been churning out crap for the last four years. He’s appeared in around 15 films since 2019 that have gone straight to video. His last actual hits came 20 years ago, before he was revealed in a DUI arrest to be a virulent antisemite who told a Malibu cop, “The Jews started all the wars,” He called a Black policewoman “Sugar tits,” denied the Holocaust to Diane Sawyer, and never looked back.
What kind of strike is SAG conducting here? This is the kind of movie they’ll allow to be made while their members are on picket lines? Color me confused.
SAG has approved 28 other films, by the way, including two legit ones from A24, one starring Anne Hathaway and the other Paul Rudd. Doesn’t that undermine the whole strike?
This is not about being woke. This is about being racist.
Country singer Jason Aldean’s video called “Try That in a Small Town” has been yanked by Country Music Television.
It should be banned everywhere. Capitol Records, part of Universal Music Group, should drop him. Shame on them for not stopping this before it got out.
No one noticed these racist lyrics when Aldean released the song in May — and that’s his weak defense.
But the video he’s made spells it out. Is he kidding? This is a dog whistle for violence against who isn’t a “good ol’ boy.” Unbelievable. This is a redneck stomp with images that are solely provocative for his based, and frightening for anyone who is vulnerable.
Here are the lyrics. This guy should be shunned everywhere.
Sucker punch somebody on a sidewalk Carjack an old lady at a red light Pull a gun on the owner of a liquor store Ya think it’s cool, well, act a fool if ya like Cuss out a cop, spit in his face Stomp on the flag and light it up Yeah, ya think you’re tough Well, try that in a small town See how far ya make it down the road Around here, we take care of our own You cross that line, it won’t take long For you to find out, I recommend you don’t Try that in a small town Got a gun that my granddad gave me They say one day they’re gonna round up Well, that shit might fly in the city, good luck Try that in a small town See how far ya make it down the road Around here, we take care of our own You cross that line, it won’t take long For you to find out, I recommend you don’t Try that in a small town Full of good ol’ boys, raised up right If you’re looking for a fight Try that in a small town Try that in a small town Try that in a small town See how far ya make it down the road Around here, we take care of our own You cross that line, it won’t take long For you to find out, I recommend you don’t Try that in a small town
The idea of taking Mattel’s number 1 doll and blanketing the world with her has worked. Greta Gerwig’s movie tie in to a toy has such high awareness that Warner Bros. is confident of making $100 million in the opening weekend.
But so far there have been no actual reviews. The studio has held them until this moment for a good reason. “Barbie” is a complicated release. Despite plucky stars Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling, and a stylized production design for the ages, the movie itself is a mystery shrouded in a puzzle. Who is this movie for? Beats me.
The movie opens pre-credits with no less than Helen Mirren telling the history of dolls in a Kubrickian send up. Little girls are out on the cliffs playing with old fashioned dolls until — in a sequence set to “Also Sprach Zarathustra” — a towering Barbie appears like the obelisk in “2001: A Space Odyssey.” The girls smash their old dolls violently and embrace Barbie. (The American Girl company may object to this.)
Cut to Barbie Land, all Pepto Bismol pink. All the girls are named Barbie, all the men are Ken except for one, called Alan (Michael Cera), Everything in Barbie Land is fake, and director Gerwig plays it for laughs — especially the mild sex stuff including jokes about having no genitalia, and no idea why Ken wants to spend the night with Barbie. (“We’re boyfriend and girlfriend!” he cries, befuddled.) But the laughs wear thin quickly.
Barbie’s world is turned upside down when she discovers a creeping sense of death and darkness. All of a sudden her world goes wrong: her perfect feet go flat, and she’s askew. She’s sent to see Weird Barbie (Kate McKinnon, in an inspired turn), who says someone is playing with her in the real world who’s got dark thoughts, basically. She says Barbie must cross the line into reality, find that girl, and set her straight. Barbie and Ken set off on their voyage in Barbie’s convertible.
They head straight for Los Angeles and Mattel, “the mothership,” which is run by Will Ferrell. He wants Barbie to get back in a box so she can be shipped back to her imaginary world. She has other ideas.
The fun really stops there. Once this charmingly nitwit duo arrive in Los Angeles, the movie loses its cool groove. Set up as a strangers in a strange land, “Barbie” suddenly become a polemic about “the patriarchy” and endless talk of female empowerment. After Mattel, they find the culprit: America Ferrara, playing a frustrated feminist whose young daughter is giving away her toys a la “Toy Story.” Now Barbie knows why she felt so bad: she’s been rejected.
There’s some wink wink stuff, and breaking of the fourth wall — Mirren’s narration interrupts a scene to point out how beautiful “Margot Robbie” is — but it all starts to sound like noisy feedback. The movie hits a speed bump when America Ferrara (who I always like) delivers a dry filibuster about Women, with a capital W. Robbie kind of stares it her agape throughout. Her thought balloon must be, “I’m glad I didn’t have to say that.”
No one is more invested in this movie than Robbie and Gosling. They are completely committed, which is the only reason why the good parts work at all. They’re very charming. But they can’t overcome the turn in the second hour into preachy politics. Gerwig seems a little lost in this film after being so assured with “Lady Bird” and “Little Women.” I don’t think she is a director for hire. She’s an auteur who’s better than studio assignments. Who is this movie for? Little girls? Young women? If they go for this, I’m happy for them. But “Barbie” is a shiny brightly wrapped gift that loses its luster very quickly. Go for the fun, ignore the rest.
Robert Kennedy Jr. is in boiling water over his video in which he declares COVID was designed to spare Ashkenazi Jews and the Chinese. Things are so bad, his sister and nephew have publicly criticized him.
His defense? He’s pals with America’s most self-publicized (and self aggrandizing) rabbi, Shmuley Boteach. He’s Kennedy is posting videos embracing Boteach. Kennedy just doesn’t get it. He’s on the wrong side of every single conversation.
I’ve been writing about Boteach since 2003 when he first emerged as Michael Jackson’s newest religious advisor. I revealed then that Shmuley had been kicked off Oxford University’s campus for financial malfeasance operating a questionable foundation. Then he came back to America and started a similar one with an unwitting Michael Jackson called Heal the Kids. They had a splashy and ridiculous fundraiser at Carnegie Hall. The New York Attorney General finally caught up with them.
In May 2001, this column discovered quite a lot about the so-called Oxford L’Chaim Society of New York, which has nothing whatsoever to do with Oxford University in Great Britain.
I wrote: “In 1999, the British government criticized (Boteach’s) L’Chaim Society of Oxford, London and Cambridge — an organization that was supposed to support and promote Jewish thinking and life on the Oxford campus — when they discovered that Shmuley (his name is Shmuel but he loves the nickname) had been dipping into the funds.
In an e-mail to the Oxford Union, Sonia Tugwell of the Charity Commission wrote on January 8, 2001: “In August 1999, the Charity Commission opened an inquiry under section 8 of the Charities Act 1993 into the L’Chaim Independent Charitable Trust as a result of concerns that the charity’s funds were being misapplied.
“The inquiry established that a number of apparent inappropriate payments were regularly being made by the founder of the charity, Rabbi Boteach and his wife. Fundraising costs and administrative expenses were high in relation to relatively low charitable expenditure.
“As a result of the inquiry, in March last year, the trustees of the charity, after taking appropriate legal advice, reached an agreement with the Boteaches. The result of this was that a sum was paid by them to the charity. The trustees of the charity decided to wind up the charity and the London and Oxford offices were closed last year with our approval. It was agreed that the assets of the Cambridge Society would be transferred to another trust. If there are any funds remaining after outstanding liabilities have been paid, these will be given to other charitable causes similar to those supported by the L’Chaim Independent Charitable Trust.”
An article dated June 1, 1998, in the London Daily Telegraph clearly states: “Ah Shmuley. The shame, the disgrace. (He’s been) publicly reproached by Elkin Levy, president of the United Synagogues; forced to resign from the synagogue in Willesden where he preaches, accused of conduct unbecoming, bringing the rabbinate into disrepute.” The resignation was apparently in response to the publication of Boteach’s controversial book, “Kosher Sex,” which has been a bestseller and was excerpted in Playbo y.
“It seems funny to me,” said a source at the Oxford Union, “that the headquarters for the L’Chaim Society of Oxford is in New York.”
Frustrated by the lack of information from Boteach’s office, I subsequently wrote another story on Feb. 18, 2002, stating that Boteach’s tax-free foundation in the United States is alled Oxford L’Chaim Society, implying a tie to the prestigious British university.
I also wrote that the L’Chaim Society’s 1999 public tax filing shows that the charity took in $300,000. Of that amount, $160,000 went to “management” and $122,000 was sent as a lump-sum donation to the L’Chaim Society of Cambridge, the other top British university.
But, of course, representatives of the Cambridge Society swore to me last year that they hadn’t heard from Boteach in a long time. Certainly they didn’t mention a huge donation, and neither did Boteach.
Even so, more than half the money collected by Boteach in 1999 went to salaries. Less than half was donated to charity. Just in case you were wondering.
The insinuation by @nypost and others that, as as result of my quoting a peer-reviewed paper on bio-weapons, I am somehow antisemitic, is a disgusting fabrication. I understand the emotional pain that these inaccurate distortions and fabrications have caused to many Jews who… pic.twitter.com/QY4BSNuP4v
— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) July 16, 2023
Well, this is life in 2023. BAFTA, the British Academy, is adding special slots to their longlists for no binary directors.
Now there will be male, female, and non binary. This is in addition to considering genderless categories. It would seem non binary players will get slots soon in the acting categories.
Here’s the statement:
“BAFTA’s 2020 Review included a positive intervention for female directors submitting into the BAFTA Film Awards Director category, allowing for a 50:50 gender split for male and female directors in the longlisting stage (16 in total). This has had a very positive effect on the number of female directors nominated and winning in this category compared with the years prior to the Review. This intervention is now being evolved to include directors who identify as non-binary.
“For 2024, the top female, male and directors who identify as non-binary will be longlisted to a maximum of 17, with gender parity between male and female directors upheld. In the nominating round, the number of nominated directors will remain at six.”
It was an unusual premiere last night in New York for Christopher Nolan’s Oscar buzzed “Oppenheimer.”
The screening at AMC Lincoln Square IMAX was packed, drawing an eclectic crowd of recognizable faces including media mogul Barry Diller and punk rock queen Patti Smith. Prodicer/activist Trudie Styler was accompanied by her son, Jake Sumner, who’s got a great documentary coming to Netflix this fall about rock and roll promoter Ron Delsener. (Sting is touring all the world to sell out crowds.)
But there were no SAG members of note, no stars from the film as the union strike prevents any promotion of films.
Director Nolan was there to introduce the film, and thanks his crews around the world. An avowed enemy of streaming, Nolan made short remarks supporting the striking actors and writers, noting “changing business models that have not kept pace” and “need to be changed.” He said very politely, very British, “We need to get back to work as soon as possible so we can keep doing what we love.”
“Oppenheimer” is three hours, and nine minutes long. Already the raves are piling in. Director Paul Schrader said to me and later Tweeted that it’s the best film of the century.” That was a lot coming from him since Schrader is bffs with Martin Scorsese, who’s got the spectacular “Killers of the Flower Moon” coming in October — and will be “Oppenheimer'”s competition in awards season. (Watch for Cillian Murphy, Robert Downey Jr., and Emily Blunt to be on the top of lists.)
Great food at the Natural History museum, and plenty of it since Universal scaled back the party so severely. But Universal chief Donna Langley was busy accepting kudos on her promotion to Head of Everything including Movies and TV. Langley has risen through the ranks over two decades, and she’s the only one in Hollywood who seems to know what they’re doing these days!
The actors and writers strikes are forcing the networks to take crucial action.
Facing a scarcity of original programming, the broadcast companies are lining up their streaming hits in reruns.
CBS is going to show Season 1 of “Yellowstone,” which already aired on their cousin, the Paramount Network.
ABC has added “Ms. Marvel” to their fall schedule, taken from Disney Plus.
And that won’t be all as the nets look over everything they own to see what they can plug holes with. Otherwise, the nets will be filmed with game shows and lots of reruns of shows that have already been rerun.
NBC has yet to pull the trigger but they have plenty of Peacock material at hand. “Poker Face” could be a 10pm show easily if cleaned up a bit.
CBS would be smart to launch all the seasons of “The Good Fight” from its long now concluded run.
Soon, all the streaming subscribers will see their shows on free TV. That could be interesting. And where is the “Downton Abbey” marathon?
