The spirit of man

Just got back from the Jeff Wayne musical 'War of the Worlds' at the Nottingham Arena, conducted by Wayne himself and starring some dude who was in 'Neighbours', some bird who was in Atomic Kitten, a fuck off big tripod and an 11-foot hologram of Richard Burton.

It was a fun show, even if it did start a tad late. Apparently somebody had to nip across the road and drag the hologram out of the pub ...



(Normal service - ie. actual film reviews - will resume tomorrow.)

January report card

As January draws to a close, the first month's voting on the next director retrospective sees Tim Burton and Chanwook Park at the head of the pack with 8 votes apiece, Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Neil Jordan not far behind with 6 votes each, and Alex de la Iglesia and F. Gary Gray lagging somewhat with 2 votes apiece. There has been no love for Mira Nair. The gizmo that reckons up the votes has assigned percentages as follows:

Jeunet: 18%
Burton: 25%
Jordan: 18%
de la Iglesia: 6%
Park: 25%
Gray: 6%
Nair: 0%

... which adds up to 98%, meaning either it can't count or it's a sexist bastard and it's hidden the 2% that someone's ponied up for Mira Nair.

And now I've done criticising the machine, I'll lob a couple of brickbats in my own direction: despite my best intentions (as expressed in my New Year's Day post), I've let the Hellraisers series slide for another month, and clocked up only one post each in the Personal Faves and Work Sucks projects. Meanwhile, I'm five movies into Operation 101010, covering four categories. 95 movies still to go.

Less talking in class. Must try harder.

And the award for innovative casting goes to ...

There's been a lot of speculation online that Jamie Foxx is a strong contender for the role of Frank Sinatra in Martin Scorsese's forthcoming biopic.

Now, while the prospect of Scorsese doing Sinatra makes me positively drool - the '50s, the suits, the cool tunes, the mob on the fringes; this kind of stuff is to Scorsese what westerns were to John Ford - I have to admit to a certain degree of concern.

Take a look at these two pictures.

Aside from the main difference (pussy-whipped Mafia bagman vs Oscar-winning actor) does anything strike you in terms of contrast?

Could it be that one is Italian-American and the other is African-American (or, to discard these nonsensical PC-isms, one's a white guy and one's a black guy)?

I couldn't get my head round it.

Then I twigged.

In Shakespearean days, men played women. Throughout the history of cinema, gay actors have played straight roles and vice versa. Able bodied actors have won encomium and awards playing disabled characters. And why not? It's the performance that counts.

So, let's get the project underway. We've got Foxx for Ol' Blue Eyes. How about Leonardo di Caprio as Sammy Davis Jnr, Chow Yun Fat as Dean Martin, Lucy Lui as Peter Lawson, and Dwayne Johnson in drag and a fuck-off big-hair wig as Ava Gardner?

Maybe Scorsese should just stick to producing and Mel Brooks could channel some of his much-missed 'Blazing Saddles'-era directorial brilliance (sample dialogue: "To tell a family secret, my grandmother was Italian").

I'd queue to see that movie.

Six degrees of happy birthday

According to IMDb, the following luminaries of the silver screen share a birthday today:

Tom Wilkinson, who starred in ‘In the Bedroom’, the debut movie of director Todd Field, who cast …

Jennifer Connelly in his follow-up ‘Little Children’, which co-starred Kate Winslet, who appeared in ‘Finding Neverland’ alongside Kelly Macdonald, whose co-star in ‘The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy’ was …

Bill Nighy.

Frank Sinatra also has a birthday today, or would have done if he’d been alive. So I guess that allows me to say that for a pussy-whipped Mafia bagman he certainly cut some decent tunes without fear of a lawsuit.

A hit, however, is another matter.

Thank you and good night.