Jezebel 
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New York, 8:26 AM
Tue Dec 15
67 posts in the last 24 hours
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12:18 AM
(A small positive note.)
12/14/09
There are a few that I'm a fan of, like "Music and Lyrics" but by and large I can't believe they continue to get made. Maybe everybody's too drunk to remember that with everyone of these movies, SPOILER ALERT: THEY END UP TOGETHER IN THE END.
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12/14/09
This is the crux of the problem. This is the question that needs answering.
The person in the movie industry who figures this out will be able to buy their own country with the money they make.
12/14/09
I'll refrain from giving my own estimate, but I doubt any theater admits 51 women for every 49 men.
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12/14/09
David: [watching The Bourne Identity]
"Y'know, I always thought that Matt Damon was like a Streisand, but he's rocking the shit in this one!"
Dargis is, in fact, ROCKING THIS SHIT in this dialog.
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12/14/09
I gotta be honest. I wrote a script that I pretty much would hand-deliver to Kathryn Bigelow on bloody bended knees. In hopes that she'd give me the time of day. Without me having to change my name to Lance Burana or L.B. Burana, or some other pretending-to-be-a-dude chicanary.
Manola makes me feel like I owe to the chicks to make this happen.
Although, I suppose Bigelwo might react more warmly to something delivered by an agent, and not some weird lady with knee-scabs and a slightly stabby look in her eyes.
But yes, SHIT ROCKAGE from Dargis to-day!
12/14/09
01:34 AM
That's how you'll know it's US.
01:50 AM
12/14/09
I do like Romantic Comedies but good ones. I do not understand why during the era when women had no power, Hollywood was making excellent movies that starred women front and center.
Mildred Pierce, All About Eve, His Girl Friday? These women were smart, flawed and great to watch on screen.
After Jaws and Star Wars teen boys became the most important demographic and things haven't been the same since.
12/14/09
"I really like Something's Gotta Give, but I don't think it's a good movie."
Is an intriguing sentence about which I think more should be said, maybe? What are we supposed to do with movies, other than like them, or really like them?
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On a side note, there's the whole phenomenon of enjoying a terrible movie ironically because it's laughably bad, but I don't think that's what Dargis is talking about when she says liked Something's Gotta Give.
12/14/09
Film is a storytelling medium, so that's where you have to start. There are narrative, structural, character, plot, pacing, and editing "rules" based on the genre. There's point of view, originality, execution, style, etc. You can break any of the rules, but you have to do it thoughtfully and consciously. So a story can work for an individual so they "like" it, but they can still understand the flaws.
To use her example, Something's Gotta Give is a fun, light, comedy about older people. And it delivers that. But it's not the best paced film, there's nothing unique in the storytelling or shots, the story is only meh, and the conclusion is predictable. Amongst many other things like the story revolving around one of two archetypes in romcoms. I this case, the uptight woman and the womanizing man. So she likes it, but understands that it's not "good" or even "great" in terms of what you can do with the medium.
There is always an element of the subjective in whether you like something. I don't "like" The Godfather, but I completely understand the status it's given. That's the distinction. A personal "like" doesn't have much to do with the success of film, as it does what you personally enjoy. Which can vary wildly.
So yes, we should be looking at more than "Did I like this movie?" Because it's more than that.
12/14/09
I mean, geez, Two and a Half freakin' men is one of the most popular shows on t.v. They can't all be Mad Men!
02:55 AM
I don't expect everything to be Mad Men. What I do expect, though, is non-insulting material. TF 2 is a really good example of a movie that not only doesn't respect film, but doesn't respect the audience either. So it doesn't matter how many people like it, ultimately, it's crap.
Contrast that with something like Big Trouble in Little China. Utterly ridiculous, but awesome. Because it uses the medium well and respects the audience.
So, while I'm not against non-arty film in any way, there's a difference between fun and light, and just plain bad. It doesn't need to all be Oh My God Serious. It does need to not treat the audience like morons, even if they maybe sometimes are.
05:16 AM
@jfruh: Glad I could oblige. Basically, when critics realize that the reason he/she likes something is purely subjective, i.e. The Prophecy's portrayal of old testament angels is spot on horrific, does not make the movie good. It makes it fun. Maybe she loved Something's Gotta Give because she laughed at a mediocre joke, or because she just loves Jack Nicholson for some unknown reason.
I am with you when you say that *something* about the filmmaking is good. I refuse to believe in guilty pleasures, if I enjoy it, there is a palpable reason. But when that reason is subjective and doesn't hold up to logical scrutiny, then it cannot help qualify a film as "good".
At least that's the way I see it, this critic could see it totally differently.
12/14/09
I know lots of Jez readers loved Julie & Julia, but I thought it was absolute crap. Julie's assertion, after sitting through an unsatisfying lunch with her "friends", that all women secretly hate their friends pissed me off to no end. I'm tired of ridiculous, hateful statements like that going unchallenged in the critical thinking vacuum of popular film.
Other than dreadful Nora Ephron, there are a few women directors I really like. I think Julie Taymor, in particular, is super cool. I really enjoyed Across the Universe, and I can't wait for next year's The Tempest, starring Helen Mirren in the gender-reversed role of Prospero.
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12/14/09
Yes, this. Crash is what made me lose all faith in the Oscars. Everyone spent the entire ceremony patting themselves on the back for being so progressive, and then awarded the best picture to a dumb-downed movie with the subtlety and nuance of a sledgehammer. If the past is any indication, the Academy will pay a lot of lip service to Kathryn Bigelow, Nora Ephron, and women in Hollywood, in general and them ignore them all when it is time to give out awards.
EDIT: Wow, I'm apparently angry today! And yes, I was rooting for Brokeback,* why do you ask?
* (although I would have been very happy with a win for the other films in the best picture category with the exception of Crash)
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What I found disheartening is that up until the last few months I (and I consider myself to be a film nerd) had never heard of Bigelow. I thought she was a young up-and-comer and this was her first effort. I had no idea she directed "Point Break" among others.
It's sad, it's taken a woman 25+ years (even with big $ and big stars in some cases) to get this kind of recognition? That's pathetic Hollywood. Her movies have shrugged off all cliches and haven't fallen into a certain stylized niche (ala Sofia Coppola) or into commercial crap (ala most female directors sadly).
And as far as movies starring women, the recent commercial films with the best and strongest female leads have been directed by men from Hollywood's old-school. I mean Clint Eastwood, the epitome of manliness, has directed two films within the last five years starring female leads. Swank and Jolie completely OWNED Million Dollar Baby and The Changeling.
If a man can competently direct movies about both men AND women, can't a woman do the same? Why does it have to be a novelty?
"OMG she likes John Wayne or Steve McQueen; and was influenced by Peckinpah or Lumet? What an idea! SHOCKING!"
12/14/09
There have actually been a fair amount of stories coming out of Sicily in recent years about women who are stepping into Cosa Nostra to take the place of their imprisoned husbands. The articles usually say things like, "They used to be there to make the manicotti, now they're the ones whacking each other!" The whole thing is pretty interesting, and would make a bad ass movie.
An example of such an article, from Newsweek:
[www.newsweek.com]
12/14/09
In other news I wholeheartedly support Ms Dargis but then again I loathe romantic comedies, oh for the days when women were allowed to be as witty if not more so then the men they were acting alongside.
12/14/09
12/14/09
That's my kind of optimism.
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12/14/09
But just play Devil's Advocate, Kathryn Bigelow made big budget star-ridden crap like K-19, Blue Steel (which helped derail the career of Jamie Lee Curtis) and of course Point Break. I won't blame her for Strange Days, but please don't act like she's been out in the wilderness begging for scraps. She's had the biggest stars of the moment and big budgets. She's had many shots at the brass ring.
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I'm not arguing that women have it shitty in Hollywood, only questioning the choice of Bigelow as some kind of "hero. " She made bad big budget films and was given multiple opportunities to do it.
12/14/09
Studios know when they have a lemon of a film--they just market the ever-lovin' crap out of it to make it a "box office success," and the cycle continues for the boy directors. The girls? Notsomuch.
12/14/09
And all the marketing in the world can't "make" a film a hit. I'm pretty sure Superman Returns was promoted everywhere but on my inner eyelids, but it was a disappointment to the point where the character has been mothballed. Not to mention Speed Racer, Land of the Lost, Insert Eddie Murphy/Kevin Costner Movie Here...the list is endless.
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I think the fact that Bigelow comes from a studio art background probably works against her in terms of the collaborative nature of film, but I'm definitely not suggesting she had to take on more notes and more studio-driven drudgery than any other director. What I am saying is if the boys don't want you to play, they are not going to pass you the ball.
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C'mon, name some female directors who have had their equally awful films boosted by marketing arms for box office purposes? Can you name even one?
12/14/09
This is my problem with her as some sort of hero. She bought into the system. She played the game and reaped the rewards of big stars in big, dumb movies that didn't do well (as opposed to Near Dark which put her on the map). But what's really amazing is how many chances she got considering she is a woman. Then again, she was Mrs. James Cameron for part of it. And it could be argued that nothing she did while his wife was hers, but an attempt to curry favor with her husband and once that ended she lost her "boys club pass" so she had to go outside the system. Sadly, the more I think about it, the more likely that seems.
And McG has only made four films, two of them were Charlie's Angels, which were produced by Drew Barrymore. We Are Marshall was a flop and Terminator Salvation, despite marketing was also a disappointment. The second Charlie's Angels was also a disappointment despite marketing, which is why there hasn't been a third. Even the first only made money after video.
12/14/09
Oh, I see now. Uh-huh. You really are angry, aren't you? I'm done on this thread. Your reasoning is steeped in the sort of stuff I don't like to get on my good shoes.
12/14/09
Not to mention that her chances might have been the result of Cameron actually supports the shitty treatment of women in Hollywood in that the only reason she got the multiple chances that only a man usually gets is because she was attached to a guy. Mimi Leder had a huge hit with Deep Impact, but then Pay It Forward bombed. Seen her at the multiplex lately?
But given how wrong you were about McG, I can see how you might need to step away because facts don't match your perceptions.
05:31 AM
Though there is the blatant mudslinging of the WB exec who said he would never fun a female lead vehicle after The Brave One failed at the box office. (Which according to imdb just about made its money back worldwide.) Of course, two women helped produce it, one of them Jodie Foster, and one woman (and three men) are credited with the screenplay, so arguably that's not a good 'female driven' film to be discussing. Yet more than a few execs think it serves as a standard. (Side note, Phillipe Rousselot DP'd it, which means I really should see it.)
There are lots of things wrong with the current studio system and the way films are approached. I don't think an 'old boys club' theory holds out when successful filmmakers like Terry Gilliam are always kicked out to the side. Yes, there are golden boys of every generation, simply because a producer decides he likes someone. But there is also nothing stopping that from happening to a woman.
Right, that was rambly, but the point, what there is of it, is in that last paragraph there.
12/14/09
I absolutely love a good romantic comedy. A good romantic comedy. But when was the last time we saw one? What about... hm. Can't even think of one. Bridget Jones' Diary, maybe. The way they keep making such terrible ones, it makes me think there's some big, hairy, sweaty man sitting behind a desk somewhere smoking a cigar, saying, "Ah, who cares! Those stupid women will watch anything!"
I tried explaining this to my mom when she asked me to go see "Love Happens" with her - that awful looking one with Jennifer Aniston and Aaron Eckhart. Her response: "Yeah, it does look terrible, but there's nothing else playing that I'd be willing to sit through!"
Is that what all the women who go to these movies are saying? Is that all the response you want, Hollywood?
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Who would just blink in surprise, neither being movie dorks.
The women in most movies make me so stabby, it's ridiculous. 'Fuck them', indeed.