And speaking of filmmakers who know a little something about battling working in Hollywood, Terry Gilliam’s new film, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, will be released in the UK on October 16.  From the sudden, tragic death of star Heath Ledger to uncertainty regarding completion of the film to unenthusiastic distribution from Sony in the US–this film has not had an easy road of it.  Gilliam and many of his fans have been eagerly getting the word out regarding its imminent release (as you’ll see below), trying to turn what was initially a tragedy into something of value.  You’ll get no argument from me that Gilliam’s work this decade has been uneven.  But Parnassus looks wonderful and the reviews have been strong on both sides of the Atlantic.

The video below shows Gilliam/Parnassus supporters getting the word out in London.  It’s not just new filmmakers who need publicity, you know.  Pretty cool.

And if you haven’t yet seen the trailer for the film… watch it below.  Gilliam is still one of our great fantasists and it looks like this may be a return to form.

The Hollywood dream factory has always sold bullshit to the eager masses.  Some years are worse than others, some decades shine brighter with genuine talent and provocative films.  And sometimes, if the stars are right… real art may be conjured.

I’m talking mainstream, commercial films here, just so we’re clear.  Films made by the major studios.  There’s just as much garbage in the pseudo-indie sphere as well and the genuine independent arena is a whole other matter.  But junk is junk and it exists anywhere and everywhere.

But screenwriter/director Charlie Kaufman thinks the situation in Hollywood is dire and getting worse.  I can’t argue that it’s a depressing situation.  Do we really need another superhero movie?  Have the studios simply given up on making films for adults?

But I’ll hold out for some sort of creative resurgence.  There’s no arguing that the current model of film distribution (just like in the music industry) is antiquated, oppressive, and in need of restructuring.  The major studios are dinosaurs and seemingly lumbering into the tar pits.  Though haven’t they always been that way?

When we least expect it, a new wave always comes crashing down.  The last time young filmmakers infiltrated the ranks of the studios (ten years ago) we saw the arrival of Charlie Kaufman, Spike Jonze, Sofia Coppola, Wes Anderson, and others.  None of them make blockbusters, of course.  But most of the films they created did make money while furthering the medium in artistic ways.

So I hold out hope.  For now.

Perhaps Kaufman will figure a way to write himself (and us) out of this narrative purgatory.

You can read Kaufman’s comments here.

I’m not going to deny it: I love seeing Republicans turn inside-out over President Obama receiving the Nobel Peace Prize this morning.  I think everyone is shocked.  But after watching the cable news shows and scanning various web pages, it seems the Republican response–and that of many liberals as well–can be summed up below.

The long-lost FBI agent Phillip Jeffries has been to the land beyond beyond.  He materializes from a dream into a dream; out of thin air with a mind crackling of electricity.  He confounds agents Cooper, Rosenfield, and Chief Gordon Cole with his ravings, but each of them knows down deep that this wreck of a man has experienced something horrifying, something truthful.

“I’ve been to one of their meetings.”

He’s witnessed the inner workings of the Black Lodge.  He’s been witness to their secret worship and seen what lurks behind the masks.  How can any man keep his sanity after such things?

He can’t.

HEAVY METAL was the soundtrack of my teenage life.  Hardcore punk/D-beat madness too and loads of Brit pop/alternative shoegazing blah blah blah.  But it always came back to METAL.  Not the pop metal glam stuff mind you, e.g. Motley Crue, Poison, Cinderella, and all that other crap.  No, I liked METAL straight-up: Sabbath, Maiden, Motorhead, Metallica, Slayer, Venom, Celtic Frost, and all the rest of the knuckle-dragging angry riff masters.  Big, brutal, epic, demonic, stoopid METAL.

I’m not proud.

Anyway, I caught Tenacious D’s infectiously silly and hilarious film Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny again this past weekend and… uh, it seemed funnier to me this time around.  Sure, I liked it enough the first time under the appropriate influences.  But this time it just seemed to click better for me.  It’s ridiculous and adolescent stuff, to be sure.  But so is METAL.  And I’m already on the record about that.

And for the record… Dio is better than Ozzy.

I’ve been working on my Spike Jonze piece for Little White Lies magazine this week and his latest film, of course, has been on my mind.  The trailer looks beautiful and I can’t wait to see it.  It certainly looks like Jonze has captured the melancholy and gentle anarchy at the heart of the story.

Below is one of my favorite first paragraphs.  Reading it again sends a chill through me and makes me want to spend the rest of the afternoon in the book’s clutches.  Can’t think of a better way to celebrate the birthday of H.G. Wells, can you?

No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man’s and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. With infinite complacency men went to and fro over this globe about their little affairs, serene in their assurance of their empire over matter. It is possible that the infusoria under the microscope do the same. No one gave a thought to the older worlds of space as sources of human danger, or thought of them only to dismiss the idea of life upon them as impossible or improbable. It is curious to recall some of the mental habits of those departed days. At most terrestrial men fancied there might be other men upon Mars, perhaps inferior to themselves and ready to welcome a missionary enterprise. Yet across the gulf of space, minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us. And early in the twentieth century came the great disillusionment.

It takes a great actor to crack up.  Not merely fall apart and babble, mewl like a baby and plummet to the floor to toss about, batter the carpet, and deliver the tantrum of all tantrums like Hitler hearing that Russia is lost.  Anyone can feel anger.  Anyone can scream and conjure up being pissed off.

But it takes a great actor to plunge into cosmic dread.  It takes an actor of Frederic Forrest’s talent to pull something like that off.

He’s the most likable character in Apocalypse Now.  Willard (Martin Sheen) is too misshapen and damaged to give a shit about.  Sure, we want him to complete his odyssey and encounter Brando, but we don’t care about him.  He’s a reptile with only memories of being human.  Chief (Albert Hall) is stoic and marvelous in his underwritten role, but he’s too authoritarian and because he cares too much, we’re suspicious.  Things have got to be pretty bad back home for him to give a shit about Vietnam.  Scary.  Clean… Mr. Clean (Laurence Fishburne) is a wild talent.  We do care and want his skinny ass far away from the napalm and madness, but he’s never gonna make it.  The kid has target written all over him.  He’s too crazy, but not crazy enough to make it out alive.  And then there’s Lance (Sam Bottoms).  He’s good for a laugh, but he’s stared into the sun too long.  He’s better off up at Spahn Ranch staying high, screwing hippie girls, and creepy-crawling with Charlie.  He’s got survivor written all over him and is beyond our sympathies.

But Chef is another matter.  We all want him to make it.  Maybe not to stare into vats of putrefying boiled meats, but maybe to work in some French bistro downtown, perfecting them sauces he’s always dreaming about when he’s not thinking about a bevy of Playmates or whatever he dreams when he’s not dreaming of being home.  And when Chef snaps in the jungle, jumps back aboard the PBR and vows to “never get off the boat” it’s like the whole damn universe has been revealed to him as the sham it is.  He’s bopped out of the Big Easy, into ‘Nam, and into Oz.  He’s living the nightmare and he can’t figure out how he’s sputtered to such a dead end.  He’s seen the tiger for what it is and he freaks.  He wants out.  He wants what all of us want.  Only problem is, he’s got to get back on that boat.

Too bad there are worse things waiting.

Saddened by the death of actor David Carradine, I’ve been wanting to post something about him but I’ve been unable to get a handle on what I wanted to say.  The “perversity” surrounding the manner of his death doesn’t really interest me… and it’s too bad that so many people are focusing on that aspect, but I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.

Actors like Carradine–geniunely weird, eccentric, volatile, and frequently great–are a dying breed.  Back when I was eleven or twelve, I came into possession of a treasure trove of Playboy magazines and read an article on Carradine back when he was still riding that post-Kung Fu wave.  I don’t recall specifically what it was in the piece that freaked me out, but I remember being shocked by how untamed and unpolished he came across, shattering my tiny mind regarding how I thought actors were supposed to behave away from the cameras.  Of course, if you can’t deliver on talent to balance out the wildness, then you’re just out-of-control.  Carradine delivered.

Anyway… here’s a link to a piece on David Carradine that pretty much sums up (more eloquently) what I think as well.

Over at the always interesting Moon in the Gutter blog, Monsieur Richey is holding a Charlie Kaufman film poll in honor of the tenth anniversary of the Kaufman/Spike Jonze feature Being John Malkovich… our first real encounter with these (still) extraordinary filmmakers.

So head on over and vote.  I’m curious to see what the results are myself.  I’m choosing Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Synecdoche, New York for my two faves.  Who’s with me?!