first thought, best thought and Clint Eastwood

I’m always fascinated with how Kerouac’s “first thought, best thought” manifesto applies to various artforms and disciplines and I noticed while watching the DVD of bonus material for Eastwood’s Million Dollar Baby that everyone who works with him talks about his nearly zen methods for mining pure instinct and achieving amazing results that lack the belabored heavy hand of over-intellectualism and pretension.

“While I was on the phone with him, I said ‘Listen, while we’re talking about writing, you understand that what you have in your hands in my first draft so we should get together and talk about your notes and your thoughts and the way you want to approach the movie’ and he said ‘No, the script’s good.’  So he shot my first draft.  Which just doesn’t happen in this town.  Hell, I wouldn’t have shot my first draft if I was directing this thing.  But he liked it and that’s the way Clint approaches a lot of what he does and you see it carried over into the acting.  He has a vision for this movie that he wants to do but he really wants to see what others bring to that.  With the actors, he does one and two takes because he wants to see what they INITIALLY bring.  And I guess it’s the same thing with the writing.  He liked what I wrote.  It was ragged and it wasn’t perfect and he liked the mistakes that were in there.”

- screenwriter Paul Haggis

“When we were first talking about how many days he wanted to shoot, I was stunned.  Because I know you CAN do that but it’s usually ME arguing for it.  The first day, the crew call was 10 o’clock and it said shoot call at 10:15.  Well, you don’t ever see that on a call sheet, it doesn’t make any sense.  I got there at 9:30, Clint was there, we had a little breakfast, the whole place was buzzing, everything was basically set up, we got the first shot at 10:03 and we moved the camera at 10:08.  So I said ‘Well, this is going to be different.’  He’s completely confident.  He edits in his head so he knows what he needs.  And he never keeps making the actors…. often, directors say ‘That’s perfect, do it again’ Well, what should they do it until they get it wrong?  What are we doing?  Clint doesn’t do that.  It’s because he’s confident and he has a great deal of experience that he knows what he has.  Also, he has no pretentiousness about him.  None.  There’s not a little drop of it in him.  And many directors are pretentious.  They WANT to cause a great deal of anxiety and concern, which makes them feel bigger.  Clint is very comfortable with who he is and he doesn’t need that.  We did the film in 38 days but 5 of those were half-days.  And not a minute of overtime.  Never.  You’ve never seen anything like that.  It was beautiful.  It was like a cool jazz musician at the top of his game.”

- producer Tom Rosenberg

James Lipton:  Did you work with Haggis at all on the screenplay?

Clint Eastwood:  Ya know, a little bit.  We talked briefly.  I hadn’t met him [prior] but we did sit down and have a meeting and I told him I liked the screenplay and he said ‘Well, whatever you want to do… What do you want to do to it?  Do you want to do a rewrite?’  And I said ‘You know I don’t think I want to do a rewrite.’”

Lipton [to Morgan Freeman]:  Have you ever had an experience, on any other film, where it was all white pages?  No pink, no yellow, no blue, no fifth revisions?

Morgan Freeman:  Uhh…

Lipton:  Ever?

Freeman:  Yeah, once… [points to Eastwood]

Lipton:  With Clint?  Of course, but with any other director?

Freeman:  No.

Lipton:  It doesn’t exist

(Source: misterpeace.com)

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Posted on Monday, November 22nd at 7:31 AM.
Devoted readers of superhero comics scream bloody murder when I dissect their icons looking for flaws. That’s essential, though, in noir. A character’s flaws drive the story. It’s what attracts me to the genre. I’m interested in damaged people because we’ve all been roughed up in one way or another.

Brian Azzarello

(Source: misterpeace.com)

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Posted on Thursday, November 18th at 11:51 PM.

A thought that occurred to me while I was watching THE EXORCIST

Horror movies almost ALWAYS prey on feminine fears… fears that are innate to the feminine experience.

In teen slasher films, girls are murdered in direct correlation with their dating or having sex with guys.  In this way, the horror relates to budding female sexuality.  In Halloween, the main character was babysitting, obviously popular among teenage girls.

And then you look at some of the more adult psychological thrillers and they’re again preying on feminine phobias, albeit adult feminine phobias.  Often, supernatural elements are just metaphor.  Rosemary’s Baby is about fear of pregnancy and betrayal by people you feel close to. 

The Exorcist is about Ellen Burstyn’s maternal fear of raising a child almost ready to hit puberty.  The demonic possession is a metaphor for the impending evils of adulthood intruding upon her innocent child and what mother doesn’t fear that?  She is helpless, just as parents are helpless to stop the progression of their babies into the wicked world of adult sin. 

The Shining was about Shelley Duvall’s fear of her husband; she had to protect her young son from the crazed masculine violence of Jack Nicholson.  All these flicks are supposed to push a woman’s panicky fear buttons. 

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Posted on Tuesday, August 10th at 1:54 PM.

I miss movies being shot on-location, in American cities, out in the streets

I re-watched Bullitt and it occurred to me how cool it is to just FEEL San Francisco circa 1968 seeping into the film.  Just watching it, you can completely absorb the way the city looked and felt, its size and shape, what people were doing there and even aspects of the culture.  That kind of verisimilitude is really beautiful.

And that level of verisimilitude can’t be faked.  Could you imagine The French Connection or Taxi Driver or Midnight Cowboy if they were shot anywhere EXCEPT New York?  You can’t just go to Canada or shoot it on a soundstage or shoot in on green screen and hope some geeks can draw a cartoon into the background and expect it to have that real, street-level, tangible quality. 

For the record, this is just one of many, many reasons to watch The Wire.

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Posted on Tuesday, August 10th at 7:54 AM.

Excerpts from a conversation about INCEPTION (spoilers)

Me: oh… the end of inception? are you asking if the top fell over?

Kate: or if you even think it matters? (cuz i dont…..but maybe thats the existentialist in me squeeing in joy at a film that i thought made is seem that it doesnt, or at least gets you thinking in the vein)

Me: i think it does matter to the character and to the story but the director wants it to be ambiguous so that you can think about YOUR OWN interpretation and you can think about how you’d like it to go… i think it’s absolutely true that the top stops and it has to stop because he’s back to reality… the top could only continue if it were still a dream… he’s rejected the false facade of happiness for something substantial…. painful, yes, but substantial… so it’s essential to the character and the resolution of the story that the top stop spinning… BUT, at the same time, Nolan doesn’t want to come out and hand you that ending like a verdict because it’s also true that there are people in the audience who wanted him to stay with the fictional version of Mal and be satisfied that way… there is that ambiguity because the director wants you to think about what is right instead of preaching it to you but i can’t imagine the story having any meaning if he didn’t wake up and choose life

also, did you say that the film makes it seem like it doesn’t matter? the choice between fantasy and reality is just OK either way? try telling that to Mal… she lost herself in the illusion and it destroyed her because she was never able to accept reality for what it was again

Kate: I dont want to say it doesnt matter cuz yes you have to consider Mal and what happened to her and the consequences those actions… had on the rest of the movie really. I just want to say as far as the ending is concerned….he got to where he wanted to be….a place where he could see his childrens faces again and the fact that the result didnt matter to him at that point….. and its a whole movie about process too

Me: well, his reality matters to him and the top is symbolic of that reality… the symbolism is the main function of the top… i don’t think he literally cared if the thing stopped spinning or not

Kate: nodshrug well yeah

Me: what do you mean when you say the whole movie is about process? that’s interesting

Kate: process? dont you think so?

Me: yes, i think so but what do you mean specifically? the process of something in particular or just systems in the way they function?

Kate: Well a couple ways really, but its most apparent in their goal to implant this idea in Fischer they couldnt just jump in and say “hey, break up your company” there was art and layers and the importance of them all… process of cobb getting back and being able to finally let go of mal… (& marion cotillard? hm? hm? i thought she was so great)

Me: oh, that’s right… yeah, that’s also true… there was a system there… and he bothered to explain it! which blew my mind because it meant that he thought about this and lived with it and planned it all out and then wrote it… that’s incredible to me… that’s so much hard work and planning and thought and it’s so much more satisfying than the lazy method, which is the route the SOPRANOS guys took in their finale yes, nolan goes through the legwork of very detailed processes… i love it for its complexity and that it cares enough to attach some sort of logic system to it…. it was a very densely layered film… yeah, she’s great… she’s a real femme fatale in the classic sense… actually, i was going into it expecting her to be a femme fatale in the classic sense but she’s MORE than that… she is a very nuanced and sad character… she is tragic

Kate: I know right?! Can you believe that…his structure and logic in this was actually a criticism of the film? I know im drawing lines from the ebert article i read earlier today but this wasn’t about the limitlessness of the dream word and all its crazy possibilities i mean, the people in this film had a very specific goal that would take a little bit of construct and order i think so anyway… and yes, tragic when it comes to Mal. And she was able to bring that in even when she got to be a little scary at points…

Me: right… i mentioned david lynch… his movies are completely brilliant and this isn’t a criticism but his dream-reality doesn’t seem to have any system to it… it’s more loosey-goosey and disturbing that way…. just a different approach to formalism, i suppose… i think Mal was this movie’s Harvey Dent… i think a few of Nolan’s films kind of sync up in terms of thematic content… i mentioned how this movie kind of relates back to MEMENTO… he’s talking about memory and the way we perceive reality and whether or not it’s ok to manipulate those things… well, there’s a thread between this and THE DARK KNIGHT, too, and that is both of those movies deal with the conflict between the Perfect Ideal and the Pragmatic Compromise… the perfect ideal was when he created his own reality for his wife but it fell apart… the pragmatic compromise was the loss of her at the end… similarly, harvey dent was the idealist whose goodness and purity had to be sacrificed for the sake of the pragmatic compromise… both movies needed that tragic sacrificial lamb to prove that reality demands we bend our notions of idealism a bit… and it’s tragic… in both cases, it was tragedy… i think aaron eckhart as harvey dent was one of the tragic performances i’ve seen… his fall from grace is heartbreaking

Kate: Thats a very very lovely correlation there sir…..im impressed…you;re very perceptive im not sure i would have really compared the 2.. Mal and Dent but i like that, its works…yes

Me: thank you i appreciate that… i’ve seen THE DARK KNIGHT so many times and I think it’s underrated in terms of depth… it’s very much about the balancing act between those two notions: the perfect ideal and the pragmatic compromise… dent being the former and batman being the latter… even the title is an allusion to dent’s downfall (he was once called the white knight of gotham or something like that) and Batman’s need to stay in the shadows to remain effective… and with Mal, she died because she refused to let go of a vision of reality that was perfect but it was untrue… THAT, i think, is the fundamental message of the movie… for cobb, his kids matter more than the comforting lie

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Posted on Tuesday, July 20th at 10:39 AM.
I just saw Inception and it was as good as, and in fact better than, people made it out to be.  Read my thoughts below. OBLIGATORY SPOILER WARNING OBLIGATORY SPOILER WARNING To begin with, it was a well executed movie on every level that you could ask for.  It was scripted, cast, and edited to perfection.  The acting was excellent and the music was typical for Hans Zimmer: explosive and powerful and dark.  Wally Pfister should be acclaimed as well because the movie looks amazing.  It would be hard to argue that this is the kind of technically accomplished movie that is so deft that it’s a rarity.  It’s also purely entertaining.  The explosions and gun play and car chases and fight scenes are more hard-hitting and visceral than in movies that have nothing going for them EXCEPT for explosions, much less ambitious auteur projects like this.  The whole thing is a wall-to-wall refutation of the popular stereotype that intelligent movies are quiet and stark and that densely-packed summer blockbusters are stupid and largely without merit.  I should add that this movie works as a pure heist film, in addition to all the other things it excels at.  Anyone who’s seen the opening sequence of The Dark Knight, which was the best heist sequence since Heat, might have guessed that Chris Nolan had this picture in him. Speaking of ways that this movie stands apart from lesser summer action movies (there are countless), I think it’s kind of remarkable that an original movie, not an adaptation, a sequel, or a remake is able to launch and fly strictly on its own merit.  That’s not common enough lately.  And everything this movie does, it does well.  It’s a stunning movie to look at and not in the cartoonish, absurd way that Avatar was.  This picture carries itself with tremendous élan: every shot is handsome, every line of dialogue perfectly intended and delivered, every visual flourish is pure class.  This is a movie where nothing feels slapdash.  Inception intends to sit at the big boy table and does. Among the ocean of deserved praise, this movie got a couple bad marks here and there but I found that they vanished as soon as the movie was allowed to unfold on its own terms.  The first complaint was that it was just TOO HARD to get into and I disagree.  The film’s eerie dream logic is actually very well explained, unlike in a David Lynch movie, where the vast majority of the creepiness comes from the fact that you are never entirely sure what you’re looking at.  Here, things are very well-constructed and well-plotted, provided the audience is paying attention.  It’s a very cerebral film and complex but it’s perfectly understandable if you’re truly watching.  The second criticism I noticed was that the movie lacks a solid emotional core.  Again, I have to disagree.  I found Mal’s death to be horribly tragic, to the point of my being nearly choked up.  Cobb is remarkably human because he has a remarkably human flaw:  He wanted everything to be perfect.  It’s easy to see yourself in his shoes… his greatest sin was wanting a better world. Which brings me to another point, and possibly the ultimate reason to consider Inception such a remarkable film:  It’s a “big picture” movie that contemplates issues much larger than itself.  It is an examination of the nature of reality versus fantasy and a questioning of the moral dilemma of suicide.  It doesn’t handle either of these issues lightly or with condescension and never preaches.  Moreover, the central theme of the film is one Nolan has touched on before, in Memento, and that is the ethical implications of deliberate self-delusion.  Would you lie to yourself if lying meant a better life?  Could you lie to yourself for love?  Nolan obviously has an affinity for film noir as his “man with a mysterious and damaged past” is a recurring theme (again, see Memento).  In this film, Cobb’s past is fraught with mistakes and bad decisions but he did them with sincere intentions, which makes him remarkably knowable.  His only redemption is to make the hard choice.  I’m sure there were people wondering if finishing the mission and going back to reality would be the right thing to do.  I found the ending tragic but also extremely optimistic.  Oddly, a science-fiction fantasy film seems to be arguing the point that maybe reality is better just because we can be sure that it’s real.  James Cameron suggested he wanted viewers to become lost in Avatar… a more immersive fantasy seems to be the goal of most big-budget filmmakers.  In an era drenched in escapism, I think it’s remarkably brave for a movie like this to choose realism just because it’s the right thing to do.  The last shot of the film is a perfect symbolic encapsulation: the top stops spinning and Cobb is much better for it.

I just saw Inception and it was as good as, and in fact better than, people made it out to be.  Read my thoughts below.

OBLIGATORY SPOILER WARNING OBLIGATORY SPOILER WARNING

To begin with, it was a well executed movie on every level that you could ask for.  It was scripted, cast, and edited to perfection.  The acting was excellent and the music was typical for Hans Zimmer: explosive and powerful and dark.  Wally Pfister should be acclaimed as well because the movie looks amazing.  It would be hard to argue that this is the kind of technically accomplished movie that is so deft that it’s a rarity.  It’s also purely entertaining.  The explosions and gun play and car chases and fight scenes are more hard-hitting and visceral than in movies that have nothing going for them EXCEPT for explosions, much less ambitious auteur projects like this.  The whole thing is a wall-to-wall refutation of the popular stereotype that intelligent movies are quiet and stark and that densely-packed summer blockbusters are stupid and largely without merit.  I should add that this movie works as a pure heist film, in addition to all the other things it excels at.  Anyone who’s seen the opening sequence of The Dark Knight, which was the best heist sequence since Heat, might have guessed that Chris Nolan had this picture in him.

Speaking of ways that this movie stands apart from lesser summer action movies (there are countless), I think it’s kind of remarkable that an original movie, not an adaptation, a sequel, or a remake is able to launch and fly strictly on its own merit.  That’s not common enough lately.  And everything this movie does, it does well.  It’s a stunning movie to look at and not in the cartoonish, absurd way that Avatar was.  This picture carries itself with tremendous élan: every shot is handsome, every line of dialogue perfectly intended and delivered, every visual flourish is pure class.  This is a movie where nothing feels slapdash.  Inception intends to sit at the big boy table and does.

Among the ocean of deserved praise, this movie got a couple bad marks here and there but I found that they vanished as soon as the movie was allowed to unfold on its own terms.  The first complaint was that it was just TOO HARD to get into and I disagree.  The film’s eerie dream logic is actually very well explained, unlike in a David Lynch movie, where the vast majority of the creepiness comes from the fact that you are never entirely sure what you’re looking at.  Here, things are very well-constructed and well-plotted, provided the audience is paying attention.  It’s a very cerebral film and complex but it’s perfectly understandable if you’re truly watching.  The second criticism I noticed was that the movie lacks a solid emotional core.  Again, I have to disagree.  I found Mal’s death to be horribly tragic, to the point of my being nearly choked up.  Cobb is remarkably human because he has a remarkably human flaw:  He wanted everything to be perfect.  It’s easy to see yourself in his shoes… his greatest sin was wanting a better world.

Which brings me to another point, and possibly the ultimate reason to consider Inception such a remarkable film:  It’s a “big picture” movie that contemplates issues much larger than itself.  It is an examination of the nature of reality versus fantasy and a questioning of the moral dilemma of suicide.  It doesn’t handle either of these issues lightly or with condescension and never preaches.  Moreover, the central theme of the film is one Nolan has touched on before, in Memento, and that is the ethical implications of deliberate self-delusion.  Would you lie to yourself if lying meant a better life?  Could you lie to yourself for love? 

Nolan obviously has an affinity for film noir as his “man with a mysterious and damaged past” is a recurring theme (again, see Memento).  In this film, Cobb’s past is fraught with mistakes and bad decisions but he did them with sincere intentions, which makes him remarkably knowable.  His only redemption is to make the hard choice.  I’m sure there were people wondering if finishing the mission and going back to reality would be the right thing to do.  I found the ending tragic but also extremely optimistic.  Oddly, a science-fiction fantasy film seems to be arguing the point that maybe reality is better just because we can be sure that it’s real.  James Cameron suggested he wanted viewers to become lost in Avatar… a more immersive fantasy seems to be the goal of most big-budget filmmakers.  In an era drenched in escapism, I think it’s remarkably brave for a movie like this to choose realism just because it’s the right thing to do.  The last shot of the film is a perfect symbolic encapsulation: the top stops spinning and Cobb is much better for it.

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Posted on Monday, July 19th at 8:55 PM. Available in higher resolution.

Best smart aleck quotes from CHINATOWN

“Alright, Curly, enough’s enough.  Ya can’t eat the venetian blinds, I just had ‘em installed on Wednesday.”

- Jake Gittes

“Tell me, did you foreclose on many families this week?”

- Gittes, in response to a mortgage banker insinuating he doesn’t do honest work

“I don’t get tough with anyone, Mr. Gittes, my lawyer does.”

- Evelyn Mulwray

“Maybe he takes it very seriously.”

- Gittes, after being reassured that Mulwray “never even kids about chasing after women”

“How’d you find about it?  You don’t drink it… you don’t take a bath in it.  They wrote you a letter?  But then, you’d have to be able to read.”

- Gittes, after Mulvihill explains they shut his water off

“Well, you’re in luck, Mr. Yelburton.  When Mulvihill here was sheriff of Ventura County, the rum runners landed hundreds of tons of booze on the beach and never lost a drop.  He ought to be able to hold onto your water for ya.”

- Gittes, commenting on the Water Department’s dubious choice for chief of security

“Well, I’ve been accused of a lot of things before, Mrs. Mulwray, but never that.”

- Gittes, after being told Hollis Mulwray thinks he’s an innocent man

“That’s alright, officer, we can make an exception this time.  I’ll see he’s careful with the matches and doesn’t burn himself.”

- Escobar, correcting a security officer for stopping Gittes for smoking

“It’s my lunch hour.  I just thought I’d drop by and see who dropped dead lately.”

- Gittes, visiting the morgue

“You’re a very nosy fella, kitty cat.  Do ya know what happens to nosy fellas?  Huh?  No?  Wanna guess?  No?  OK.  They lose their noses.”

- Man with knife

“Mrs. Mulwray, you’ll have to explain that.  I do matrimonial work, it’s my métier.  When a wife tells me she’s happy that her husband is cheating on her, it runs contrary to my experience.  Unless she was cheating on him.”

- Gittes

“I goddamn near lost my nose.  And I like it.  I like breathing through it.”

- Gittes

“Only when I breathe.”

- Gittes, after being told by Yelburton that the cut on his nose “must really smart”

“It’s fine, as long as you don’t serve the chicken that way.”

- Gittes, on fish being served with the head

“If you want an answer to that question, Mr. Cross, I’ll put one of my men on the job.”

- Gittes, when asked if he’s slept with Evelyn Mulwray

“He passed away two weeks ago and one week ago, he bought the land.  That’s unusual.”

- Gittes, on the strange fate of Jasper Lamar Crabb

“What happened to your nose, Gittes?  Did somebody slam a bedroom window on it?”

- Loach

“Nope.  Your wife got excited, she crossed her legs a little too quick.  You understand what I mean, pal?”

- Gittes, in response

Screenplay by Robert Towne

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Posted on Wednesday, July 14th at 7:42 AM.