Access Atlanta > Movies > Blog > Archives > 2006 > October
October 2006
It’s not too early to give Oscar voters a little nudge
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Dear Mr. Smithee,
I really enjoy reading your column and appreciate your flippant mood. I want to know, is it me or are movies really as trite and boring as I think they are?
Being a wannabe writer, I can almost predict what one will say or what will happen and can almost play the violin before they do.
And why is it so hard to find what I will call a classic, poignant film such as “Harold and Maude”?
I also find greatness in such moives as “Evil Under the Sun.”
I understand they are worlds apart in genre, but that might explain my eclectic taste.
CINDY KERI, Woodstock
Dear Rest Assured, My Dear, It’s You,
Of all the films in all the world that you could possibly select to praise … and you chose “Evil Under the Sun”?
Personally, while I’ve never found an Agatha Christie movie to be unduly trite or boring, I can assure you I’ve never found one to contain its fair share of what my nimble mind would determine to be greatness.
I will grant you that “Harold and Maude” - especially in the context of the era in which it was made - is a fine film. But, of course, I can think of dozens of films that are noticeably better.
Indeed, the bulk of movies are trite and boring. I know, I sit through dozens and dozens of them each month.
But there are many movies worth anyone’s time. Which suggests that now is as good a time as any to offer the following:
MR. SMITHEE’S POSSIBLY TOO EARLY OSCAR PREDILECTIONS
You see, Cynthia, my cabbage, I’ve already seen enough of this year’s crop of movies to have developed a few favorites as Academy Award contenders.
Granted, my taste doesn’t always follow suit with those creaky-old and wrinkly Oscar voters. (Not you, Miss Fonda. I must say, you always look ravishing.)
But I strongly urge that the esteemed of Hollywood give due consideration to these films and personages in these categories:
BEST PICTURE: To date, I have been remarkably stirred by three films - “United 93,” “The Queen” (opening today in Atlanta) and the part-scary and always magical “Pan’s Labyrinth” (which won’t find its way to Atlanta until January). I also admire in opposite ways “The Departed” and “Little Miss Sunshine.”
BEST ACTRESS: Surely Helen Mirren in “The Queen,” plus Kate Winslet in “Little Children” and Meryl Streep in “The Devil Wears Prada.”
BEST ACTOR: I’m favoring Forest Whitaker in “The Last King of Scotland” and Ryan Gosling in “Half Nelson.” Plus Leonardo DiCaprio in “The Departed,” and maybe, just maybe, Matt Damon in “The Departed” if I’m happening to feel generous.
BEST DIRECTOR: So far, this one’s easy - Paul Greengrass (“United 93”), Stephen Frears (“The Queen”), Guillermo del Toro (“Pan’s Labyrinth”) and Martin Scorsese (“The Departed”).
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Silvia Syms in “The Queen” (can you tell yet that I like this movie?), Diane Lane in “Hollywoodland” and, especially, Shareeka Epps in “Half Nelson.” Also, Maggie Gyllenhaal in “World Trade Center,” Adriana Barraza in “Babel” (which opens in metro Atlanta on Nov. 10) and Rinko Kikuchi in “Babel.”
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: It’s a crowded field. John C. Reilly in “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby,” Steve Carell in “Little Miss Sunshine,” James Cromwell in “The Queen,” Michael Sheen in “The Queen,” Laurence Fishburne in “Akeelah and the Bee” and Adam Beach in “Flags of Our Fathers.” Plus, surprise, not Jack Nicholson (he doesn’t need my help anyway) but definitely Mark Wahlberg in “The Departed.”
By the way, I just wish there was a category in here for “The Descent.” I also really like Australia’s “The Proposition” and Lars von Trier’s “Manderlay,” but they’re not the kind of films Oscar notices.
And because this is what you really want to know, here’s a short list of upcoming films one could - if one had seen them - consider some kind of major disappointment: Russell Crowe’s “A Good Year” and Nicole Kidman’s “Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus.”
I have yet to see the following films, but I am anticipating them: “Casino Royale” (Nov. 17), “For Your Consideration” (Nov. 17), “The Fountain” (Nov. 22), “The Good German” (late December or early January), “Volver” (Dec. 22), “Children of Men” (Dec. 25) and the follow-up to the vampire-laden “Night Watch,” “Day Watch” (opening to be determined.
ALAN
P.S. You get a “Catch a Fire” diary and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
HAVE A QUESTION FOR MR. SMITHEE?
E-mail him at alansmithee@ajc.com or go to accessAtlanta.com and click on Movies. Please include your name, city and daytime phone number. Mr. Smithee can’t reply to every request but inquiries chosen for publication will receive movie-related prizes.
Permalink | Comments (1) | Categories: Alan Smithee
Spill the chills…
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
In Friday’s Movies & More, AJC movie writers Eleanor Ringel Gillespie, Bob Longino and Steve Murray each offer an unlucky 13 suggestions of movie moments — not necessarily from horror flicks — guaranteed to send a tingle up your spine. Read the story here.
What are your favorite scary movie moments? Which flicks really gave you the shivers and had you cowering at home under the covers? Tell us!
Garden Hills memories
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Lefont Garden Hills Cinema, which opened on Peachtree Street in 1946, will close on Sunday. The single-screen theater offered foreign and art-house films that might not play on other, intown screens.
To read the full story click here.
What are your moviegoing memories from that theater?
That blue kid’s got nothing on a guy with a chain saw
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It’s official. I am OVER this whole J-horror bull-[bodily waste].
You know, these Hollywood remakes of Japanese movies like “The Ring” and “Ring Two” and “Pulse” and now “The Grudge 2” — the sequel to a movie that was only so-so to start with.
Why’re they remaking Japanese movies anyway? We already got a fine cinematic tradition of American horror, like Leatherface and Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees and Mel Gibson. (Well, I think he’s scary.)
Why pay good money to see these blue-skinned, black-haired Japanese ghosts play phantom peekaboo with [ignorant-bottomed] Americans who go to Japan and do exactly what they shouldn’t?
Like walk inside the “Grudge” house — the one everybody knows is super-haunted.
This time, Amber Tamblyn turns up as the sister of Sarah Michelle Gellar, who survived the first “Grudge” but eats dirt in the sequel.
That’s not a spoiler. The movie trailer gives it away — but the trailer doesn’t warn you how FUNNY it is when Sarah falls off a roof and goes splat right in front of her sis. (I don’t know why it’s funny, it just is, and the folks I watched the movie with laughed their [buttocks] off, too.)
Before she snuffs it, Sarah’s so concerned about Amber’s safety, she waits till she’s OUT OF THE ROOM, then whispers, “Don’t go in that house.”
Yeah, well, what do YOU think Amber winds up doing?
There’s also three high school girls that go there. Two Snot Queens drag a geek girl to the House of Blue People and tell her, “Anyone who goes inside gets the curse.”
Soon enough, all three of them are getting haunted by Kayako, that blue-skinned woman with the long black hair. And her blue-skinned son Toshio, the kid that yowls like a [romantically stimulated] cat.
Been there, seen that. …
I mean, I liked the school girls in their little plaid skirts. And the part where they’re in their panties in the locker room. But this time, when those ghosts show up and shuffle around, they’re about as scary as guinea pigs.
Eek! There’s a dead blue boy under my desk!
So? KICK him in the face!!!
Eek! There’s a dead blue girl under my bedspread!
OK. Kick her in the head!!!
How hard is that?
Anyway, back to Amber — who skulks through the whole movie going boo-hoo — she hooks up with this Japanese journalist dude who’s done all this research that turns out to be totally useless. He tells Amber that Kayako’s mom was some sort of psychic channeler that yanked evil spirits out of people. I don’t know how they spell her job description in Japanese, but the way he says it, it sounds like “Eat Taco.”
I mean, come on - are we supposed to take that seriously? “My child is possessed — I must take her to see Eat Taco!”
Anyway, Amber — still bawlin’ — travels halfway across Japan to track down Kayako’s mom (that’s Miss Eat Taco to you) and have her put a leash on her dead daughter. But Miss Eat Taco says she can’t do anything about the curse and goes, “It will not stop. It will grow.”
Waiter! Check!
Oh, I forgot to tell you the part of the movie set in Chicago, where Jennifer “Flashdance” Beals goes insane and decides to add “kill my family” to her to-do list. Seems the Blue’s Ghouls have come for a Chi-town holiday. (No, I don’t know how. Looking for sense in this movie is like looking for an actual pony at the Pink Pony.) And they’re turning Jennifer’s whole apartment building crazy.
Like Jennifer’s stepdaughter, Lacey (Sarah Roemer)? She goes next door to visit her best friend. And her best friend just gives her that familiar I-am-possessed look, chugs down a whole half-gallon of milk, then upchucks it back into the carton. And Lacey goes, like, Oh, OK, maybe I’ll come back later when you’re feeling better. …
Seriously, the movie is stupid that way.
Anyway, while I was writing this review, I had to find out what the run time of the movie was, so I could put it in the little fact box. And everywhere I looked, they had it down as being around an hour and a half. But unless some aliens abducted me from the Regal 24 and made me lose track of time, I swear this movie dragged out to closer to an hour and 45 minutes. And that’s about 45 minutes more than there is a story. Oh, there’s a lot of big-eyed ghosts popping up and going “oogedy-boogedy,” and waving their hair all over the place. But I’ve got one thing to say to all these J-horror ghosts: Get a tan and a haircut — am I right?
Please, no, not the ‘Lady in the Water’ torture!
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Dear Mr. Smithee,
I always go straight to your column on Fridays. I usually need a laugh before the weekend. Anyway, to the point: Johnny Knoxville and his gang from “Jackass: Number Two” should sit through a 24-hour marathon of “Lady in the Water.”
I mean, it did get an “F,” right?
JORDAN MOHLER, Clarkesville
Dear Torture Lover,
I sit in wonder.
Who is, exactly, the target of your wrath?
Is it the innocent Knoxville and cohorts who somehow have found a moment’s joy and the ability to fork over the monthly rent by performing in a disgusting manner?
Or did you, like me, suffer through the ignoble choice of entering a movie theater and exposing previously unspoiled eyes to M. Night Shamalamadingdong’s ridiculously putrid fantasy drama “Lady in the Toilet”?
(And you are so right, it got a well-deserved “F” from Atlanta Journal-Constitution film critic Eleanor Ringel Gillespie; and to be truthful, I would have been less kind.)
Since “Lady” has nothing to do with horse semen, I fear the “Jackass” crowd would find themselves in a theater with absolutely nothing of merit to do.
They’d simply suffer the same fate that befell the rest of us - terminal boredom.
The bottom line here, really, is that “Jackass” is a better movie than “Lady.” A much better movie.
I wouldn’t even wish “Lady” on Steve-O.
ALAN
P.S. You get a “The Departed” T-shirt and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
Dear Mr. Smithee,
I recall a movie from the late 1960s starring Vincent Price having a warship dirigible that he was going to rule the world with. This may have been a Walt Disney adaptation of a Jules Verne story.
Somehow, the heroes ended up onboard and may have thwarted his efforts. I would love to get a video of it. Do you know the title of the film?
By the way, I just saw the Alan Smithee documentary, and they say you don’t exist. It’s amazing you can write as well as you do without being a real person.
JIM PAINTER, Sidney, Ohio
Dear Time Troubled,
It’s spring forward, fall back, Jimbo.
Your clock is off.
In 1961 - that’s what we in the real world refer to as the early 1960s - the stalwart American International Pictures released “Master of the World,” starring Vincent Price as a mad genius intent on flying around in his giant zeppelin-style cruise ship and declaring war on war. (I am not making this up.)
The film is based on two Verne books - 1886’s “Clipper of the Clouds” (aka “Rubur the Conqueror”) and 1904’s “Master of the World.”
One can imagine the whole enterprise being an attempt to bank a few greenbacks in the wake of Disney’s 1954 behemoth “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.”
Video and DVD rights of “Master of the World” belong to MGM.
Unfortunately, on the official Web site, copies of the film are unavailable. You can, however, find copies online at places like Amazon.com.
By the way, I am not a machine. As John Hurt so eloquently states in “The Elephant Man,” “I am a human being.”
ALAN
P.S. You get “Little Miss Sunshine” goodies and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
Dear Mr. Smithee,
Thanks for reminding me in your previous column on food movies of that delicious Stanley Tucci film “Big Night.”
That causes me to think of another little gem with Tucci and Oliver Platt that was a hilarious homage to the Hope/Crosby “road” movies. But I can’t think of the name.
Do you remember it?
GENE BESSENT, Decatur
Dear Oh No, Thank You,
Only because of your kind missive, Gene, has the title “The Impostors” re-entered my overworked brain.
It was a movie I saw in 1998 and couldn’t wait to extract from memory.
Oh, what a loathsome bit of indie tripe. A comedy movie so humorless. A train wreck homage to the Marx Brothers.
I am so happy for you that you enjoyed the movie. I am so sad for me that you enjoyed the movie.
ALAN
P.S. You get a “Hollywoodland” T-shirt and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
HAVE A QUESTION FOR MR. SMITHEE?
E-mail him at alansmithee@ajc.com or go to accessAtlanta.com and click on Movies. Please include your name, city and daytime phone number. Mr. Smithee can’t reply to every request, but inquiries chosen for publication will receive movie-related prizes.
Permalink | | Categories: Alan Smithee
Please, no, not the ‘Lady in the Water’ torture!
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Dear Mr. Smithee,
I always go straight to your column on Fridays. I usually need a laugh before the weekend. Anyway, to the point: Johnny Knoxville and his gang from “Jackass: Number Two” should sit through a 24-hour marathon of “Lady in the Water.”
I mean, it did get an “F,” right?
JORDAN MOHLER, Clarkesville
Dear Torture Lover,
I sit in wonder.
Who is, exactly, the target of your wrath?
Is it the innocent Knoxville and cohorts who somehow have found a moment’s joy and the ability to fork over the monthly rent by performing in a disgusting manner?
Or did you, like me, suffer through the ignoble choice of entering a movie theater and exposing previously unspoiled eyes to M. Night Shamalamadingdong’s ridiculously putrid fantasy drama “Lady in the Toilet”?
(And you are so right, it got a well-deserved “F” from Atlanta Journal-Constitution film critic Eleanor Ringel Gillespie; and to be truthful, I would have been less kind.)
Since “Lady” has nothing to do with horse semen, I fear the “Jackass” crowd would find themselves in a theater with absolutely nothing of merit to do.
They’d simply suffer the same fate that befell the rest of us - terminal boredom.
The bottom line here, really, is that “Jackass” is a better movie than “Lady.” A much better movie.
I wouldn’t even wish “Lady” on Steve-O.
ALAN
P.S. You get a “The Departed” T-shirt and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
Dear Mr. Smithee,
I recall a movie from the late 1960s starring Vincent Price having a warship dirigible that he was going to rule the world with. This may have been a Walt Disney adaptation of a Jules Verne story.
Somehow, the heroes ended up onboard and may have thwarted his efforts. I would love to get a video of it. Do you know the title of the film?
By the way, I just saw the Alan Smithee documentary, and they say you don’t exist. It’s amazing you can write as well as you do without being a real person.
JIM PAINTER, Sidney, Ohio
Dear Time Troubled,
It’s spring forward, fall back, Jimbo.
Your clock is off.
In 1961 - that’s what we in the real world refer to as the early 1960s - the stalwart American International Pictures released “Master of the World,” starring Vincent Price as a mad genius intent on flying around in his giant zeppelin-style cruise ship and declaring war on war. (I am not making this up.)
The film is based on two Verne books - 1886’s “Clipper of the Clouds” (aka “Rubur the Conqueror”) and 1904’s “Master of the World.”
One can imagine the whole enterprise being an attempt to bank a few greenbacks in the wake of Disney’s 1954 behemoth “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.”
Video and DVD rights of “Master of the World” belong to MGM.
Unfortunately, on the official Web site, copies of the film are unavailable. You can, however, find copies online at places like Amazon.com.
By the way, I am not a machine. As John Hurt so eloquently states in “The Elephant Man,” “I am a human being.”
ALAN
P.S. You get “Little Miss Sunshine” goodies and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
Dear Mr. Smithee,
Thanks for reminding me in your previous column on food movies of that delicious Stanley Tucci film “Big Night.”
That causes me to think of another little gem with Tucci and Oliver Platt that was a hilarious homage to the Hope/Crosby “road” movies. But I can’t think of the name.
Do you remember it?
GENE BESSENT, Decatur
Dear Oh No, Thank You,
Only because of your kind missive, Gene, has the title “The Impostors” re-entered my overworked brain.
It was a movie I saw in 1998 and couldn’t wait to extract from memory.
Oh, what a loathsome bit of indie tripe. A comedy movie so humorless. A train wreck homage to the Marx Brothers.
I am so happy for you that you enjoyed the movie. I am so sad for me that you enjoyed the movie.
ALAN
P.S. You get a “Hollywoodland” T-shirt and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
HAVE A QUESTION FOR MR. SMITHEE?
E-mail him at alansmithee@ajc.com or go to accessAtlanta.com and click on Movies. Please include your name, city and daytime phone number. Mr. Smithee can’t reply to every request, but inquiries chosen for publication will receive movie-related prizes.
Permalink | | Categories: Alan Smithee
The best World War II movies
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Our movie critics listed 21 of their favorite, sometimes little-seen, World War II movies (plus a list of titles everyone should know).
Click here to read the full story..
What do you think of the list? Agree? Disagree?
What are some of your favorite WWII movies, and why?
Permalink | Comments (30) | Categories: Talk about movies
Jack’s back, and it doesn’t get any cooler than that!
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Man!!!! Right on the hind-end of “Jackass: Number Two,” here comes another one of the best movies of the whole entire year.
“The Departed” is a GREAT, bloody thriller that throws all sorts of curveballs at you. Sure, you might get lost in some of the plot twists, but every few minutes somebody’s head splats open like a rotten, red pumpkin and snaps you back awake.
And… it’s the very first film where you can really believe Leonardo DiCaprio is a grown-up and finally has hair sprouting in all the right places! (More on that in a minute.)
Leo plays this Southie Boston guy who grew up in a family of bookies and lowlifes and an aunt with cancer who shows up at the front door, smoking, even though she’s got oxygen tubes stuck in her nose. I could relate.
But Leo wants to put all that behind him and be a cop. Only, when he graduates from Cop School, Martin Sheen calls him up to his office.
See, Sheen’s in charge of Beantown’s super-duper-secret undercover squad. His second-in-charge is Marky Mark Wahlberg, who’s got a mouth on him so filthy, if he kissed his Mama with it she’d turn into a peg-legged crack whore.
Marky Mark tells Leo he doesn’t have what it takes to be a cop, and says things like, “How [fornicated] up are you?”
Marky Mark gets him so riled that Leo steps up to the challenge and goes undercover to be a stoolie for the cops and infiltrate the mob run by Jack Nicholson. Leo has to convince Jack that he’s got [mature male reproductive spheres] by breaking beer mugs on a drunk’s head and shooting people. It’s a sweet setup.
Meanwhile, back at the precinct, the newest detective is Matt Damon. And he’s got a worse job than Leo because he has to file reports and do paperwork and stuff. Only, he’s secretly in the mob’s pocket and lets Jack know about any stings the cops are planning.
Meanwhile (Part 2), Leo is telling Martin Sheen what Jack’s crew is up to.
And once the cops and the mob get wind that they’ve both got a mole on the inside, it’s Matt and Leo’s job to find out who the other guy is.
That’s when the plot goes crazy. And the heads start splattering. AWESOME!!! And the elevator scene??? [Fornicating underworld!!!]
Matt is pretty good as the creep who acts like a Boy Scout, but it’d be hard to buy him in the role if he hadn’t done those “Bourne” flicks.
I was way more worried about Leo. I know Leo’s in his 30s, finally. But just two years ago, when he did “The Aviator” playing Howard Hughes, and he had that mental breakdown all naked and unshaven? I could swear they smeared honey on his face and stuck [intimately located] hairs on to make him look like an adult.
But with “Departed,” it looks like Leo finally has his own [intimately located] hairs and [mature male reproductive spheres].
You believe him when he’s driving with his druggy, [procreated-up] cousin and snarls, “Just try to limit it to two eight-balls an hour.” And when Leo’s arm gets broken and Jack Nicholson has a goon smash open the cast to make sure he’s not wearing a wire? I believed that, too. Leo screams pretty [gosh] good.
Then there’s Jack, as the mob boss. At the start of the movie, when he’s grooming little Matt Damon to be his mole-in-the-pocket, Jack gives him this whole Life Lesson and says, “No one gives it to you, you have to take it.”
Looks like Jack took that advice to heart. Even though director Marty Scorsese gave him the greatest role in the movie, whenever he’s on-screen Jack tries to take anything else he can get away with.
Like pointing a gun at Leo’s head just for the fun of it. Or running around a porn theater with [an artificial male sexual organ] flapping out his pants. Or doing this sex scene with a couple of hookers and a fishbowl full of coke.
Even without green hair, you half-expect him to start screaming for Vicki Vale, like in “Batman.” And that’s great, because who wants to see Jack, like, ACT? He tried doing that in “About Schmidt.” And what did that get him but a hot tub scene with naked Kathy Bates — who showed us all why she did NOT have a starring role in “Showgirls.”
Man, don’t you wanna be Jack Nicholson? I do. Except for the whole fat and old and balding [excrement].
When the day ever comes that we don’t have Jack Nicholson chewing up the screen and swinging [an artificial male organ] at the camera … well, as far as I’m concerned, that means the terrorists have won — am I right?
Permalink | Comments (3) | Categories: The 'B' Movie King
Don’t ask what’s in that stuff they squirt on popcorn
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Dear Mr. Smithee,
Though we have never met, I will confess my darkest secret to you: I am food obsessed. I am remembering “Frankie and Johnny,” “Fried Green Tomatoes,” “Chocolat,” “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore” and the venerable “Tom Jones.”
Are any of these good movies? And please tell me what I’ve missed so I can rush to the video store, where, as you know, they also sell food.
ELLEN ABRAMS, West Palm Beach, Fla.
Dear It’s Time to Fire Up Your Hybrid Toyota,
Are you trying to convince me that your lips smack and your mouth waters even after you learn in “Fried Green Tomatoes” that, at least once, that oh-so-good barbecue was, well, soylent green?
Sweetheart, you’re primed for “The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover.” I dare you to watch it. And don’t miss the French “Delicatessen” and the Danish “The Green Butchers.”
Oh, heck, just rent “Motel Hell.” It will cure you of your kind of food cravings. I swear you’ll never eat a sausage again.
To be honest, I’ve never seen “Frankie and Johnny,” and I doubt I ever will. (Once started, my gag reflex won’t quit.)
I do like “Alice Doesn’t Liver Here Anymore.” Sort of. And “Tom Jones” is rollicking fun if it’s 1963. As it was back at the Dawn of Man.
These, my dear Ellen, are the best food/restaurant movies: “Big Night” (Italian), “Eat Drink Man Woman” (Asian), “The Age of Innocence” (uppity New York), “Dinner Rush” (downity New York), “Mostly Martha” (German) and “Babette’s Feast” (Danish - with a French palate).
Notice that there is no great food movie having much to do with Great Britain.
Nobody with any sense lets something like haggis pass through their lips. Especially with recipe ingredients that begin with “1 sheep’s lung” followed by “1 sheep’s stomach.”
My apologies to anyone trying to finish breakfast.
ALAN
P.S. You get a special “The Da Vinci Code” portable CD player and CD from the movie and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
Dear Mr. Smithee,
What movie, new or old, currently holds the record for the most f-words mouthed throughout the movie?
KEVIN McCOY, Norcross
P.S. I have close to 500 movies in my collection (DVD and VHS). How many do YOU have, and which is your favorite?
Dear Look Behind You,
That terrible face of destiny you see barreling toward your innocent self can be identified as Mother Smithee.
She’s got a bar of lye soap.
Trust me, take your medicine and let it go. Don’t compound the situation.
Get down on your knees and beg for forgiveness and the salvation required to escape the fiery depths of a perilous, raging inferno.
Purge thy evil, son.
And by the way, while it’s hardly the final authority on anything, the online Wikipedia claims the new one-word titled documentary on the subject of which you speak has 629 verbal references to the f-word and all its magical forms.
The rest of the top 10 (in order): 1997’s “Nil by Mouth” (428 references), 1995’s “Casino” (398), 2005’s “Jarhead” (335), 1997’s “Twin Town” (318), 1999’s “Summer of Sam” (315), 2002’s “Martin Lawrence LIve: Runteldat” (311), 1990’s “Goodfellas” (300), 2002’s “Narc” (297) and 1998’s “Another Day in Paradise” (291).
My first guess would have been “Glengarry Glen Ross,” but it’s almost grade school in comparison. It ranks No. 77 with a mere 133 references.
ALAN
P.S. You get a “The Guardian” cap and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
P.P.S. By the way, I have more than 2,000 DVDs and videos and would certainly have more if my sticky-fingered sons, D.W. and Cecil B., weren’t long-standing pilferers.
And my favorite DVD right now remains “Alien Quadrilogy,” the nine-disc boxed set released in 2003.
Dear Mr. Smithee,
Since we all know that Alan Smithee is a name someone uses to conceal his or her identity, is it possible that Jordy “Ray” Purlky Jr. and you are actually the same person?
D. CHRIS MONTROY, Snellville
Dear So Very Wrong,
One of the columns (guess which one) requires a brain.
ALAN
P.S. You get an “All the King’s Men” T-shirt and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
HAVE A QUESTION FOR MR. SMITHEE?
E-mail him at alansmithee@ajc.com or go to accessAtlanta.com and click on Movies. Please include your name, city and daytime phone number. Mr. Smithee can’t reply to every request, but inquiries chosen for publication will receive movie-related prizes.
Permalink | Comments (1) | Categories: Alan Smithee
He’s shoveling answers to make poor man’s dollar
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Dear Mr. Smithee,
Last week, you answered a question about famous painters on film.
I would like to know the same about famous musicians on film. “Immortal Beloved,” “Impromptu,” “Spring Symphony,” “Amadeus” and the soon-to-be-released “Copying Beethoven” are a few I know.
I am also interested in hearing about movies featuring famous rock ‘n’ roll musicians. So far I have seen “The Doors,” “Backbeat” and “Hysteria.”
SHOMIT SENGUPTA, Smyrna
Dear Maestro,
At my first recital, I sang a solo of “I’m a Little Teapot.”
Imagine the thrill in my 4-year-old heart when Grandmother Smithee publicly presented me with a big red fire truck. It was plastic.
Imagine my dismay when my overly jealous brother smashed my prized truck with his big fat shoe.
Guess what … Brother never saw it coming when, later, as we re-enacted cowboys we had seen on TV, a certain someone snuck up behind him and conked him on the head with my toy gun - made of metal.
To be truthful, musicianship runs in my family.
I also recall as a wee lad finding a sheet of my father’s music that carried the following credits: “Lyrics by Alan Smithee Sr. / Music by Ludwig van Beethoven.”
But I digress …
“Immortal Beloved” and “Amadeus,” of course, are outstanding biopics. Clearly two of the best ever.
You might also want to sample, for kicks, “Song Without End” (1960) with Dirk Bogarde as Franz Liszt. Or watch Cornel Wilde play Frederic Chopin in “A Song To Remember” (1945). In that film, Hungarian Stephen Bekassy plays Liszt.
Tchaikovsky is the subject of Ken Russell’s “The Music Lovers” (1970) and the 1969 Russian drama “Tchaikovsky,” narrated by Laurence Harvey.
“Song of My Heart” (1948) involves Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakoff and Moussorgsky. Horst Buchholz plays Johann Strauss in “The Great Waltz” (1972), and Robert Powell portrays Gustav Mahler in “Mahler” (1974).
I heartily recommend these: “Hilary and Jackie” (1998), “Shine” (1996) and, though it’s not exactly classical, “Scott Joplin” (1977) with Billy Dee Williams in the title role.
Though fiction, guaranteed to be wire-hangerless is Joan Crawford’s “Humoresque” (1946).
As for rock musicians, I’d like to expand things a bit and include not only singers, but a few other genres and, in some cases, fictional characters.
My reasoning, partially, is this: “Coal Miner’s Daughter” is the best musical biopic ever made. And I say that having seen “Amadeus.”
So see that one and these: “Sid and Nancy” (1986), “8 Mile” (2002), “What’s Love Got to Do With It” (1993), “Ray” (2004), “Walk the Line” (2005), “La Bamba” (1987), “Grace of My Heart” (1996), “Selena” (1997), “The Buddy Holly Story” (1978), “Lady Sings the Blues” (1972), “A Hard Day’s Night” (1964) and “Let It Be” (1970).
You can see “Tommy” (1975) if you just want to hear music from the Who and watch Ann-Margret writhe in a big pile of beans.
And, thanks to the ever-watchful eyes of my brilliant sons, D.W. and Cecil B., you must, my good Shomit, get your hands on the glorious “Mystery Science Theatre 3000 Collection, Volume 6” DVD celebration of the jaw-dropping 1957 musical short, “Mr. B Natural.”
There’s nothing more grand than watching a young boy named Buzz receiving musical instructions from a weird woman clad in an ugly leotard.
You won’t be sorry.
ALAN
P.S. You get my immensely cool “Nacho Libre” cloth mask and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
Dear Mr. Smithee,
Are you familiar with a ’60s movie “You’re a Big Boy Now”? I recall the actors roller-skating in the New York Public Library and a character named Barbara Darling. No one else remembers it. Am I crazy?
TOM MCDERMOTT, Wilmington, N.C.
Dear Flower Child,
Man, I invented the ’60s.
Not only was there a Barbara Darling in “You’re a Big Boy Now,” but there was a Miss Nora Thing and an albino hypnotherapist.
“Big Boy,” based on David Benedictus’ novel and carrying the tagline “The Sexual Awakening of a Young Man at a Most Ungodly Hour,” was Francis Ford Coppola’s first movie and his master’s thesis at UCLA.
People are better off remembering “The Graduate.”
ALAN
P.S. You get a “The Departed” cap and an “Ask Alan Smithee” T-shirt.
HAVE A QUESTION FOR MR. SMITHEE?
You can e-mail him at alansmithee@ajc.com or go to accessAtlanta.com and click on Movies. Please include your name, city and daytime phone number. Mr. Smithee can’t reply to every request, but inquiries chosen for publication will receive movie-related prizes.
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