Had the pleasure to see the Muppets in a wonderful exhibit in Grand Rapids last year and this film served as an excellent reminder of that inspirational day.
In his own words:
“Life’s like a movie, write your own ending. Keep believing, keep pretending.”
I will likely always be more of a George Carlin or Kurt Vonnegut, but I will forever strive to be a Jim Henson.
Truly the day cinema peaked.
Two massive tomes I finally conquered: The Stand and The Pale King. Wouldn’t necessarily recommend either but I am glad I read both.
Of course I love reading about movies. After making a list of my favorite (read: not the ones I think are the best) films, I realized two filmmakers had four films on my list: PT Anderson, and one that surprised, Sidney Lumet. I immediately sought out his book Making Movies. It was a bit dated in describing how the sausage is made, but it had a lot of great stories and even better advice, bits that carry over to the creation in any art form.
Shea Serrano’s Movies and Other Things was fun, and made me laugh several times.
After re-watching The Godfather and its first sequel, I picked up the novel, which was fun, pulpier than the films and had an iconic inside cover. After I read Leave the Gun, Take the Cannoli, which was even better.
Recently finished Mrs. Maisel and wanted to keep living in that world as well, so I finished my copy of Lenny Bruce’s How to Talk Dirty and Influence People and have come to the conclusion that I prefer the fictional portrayal.
And of course I love reading about music. More specifically The Beatles. Read Revolution in the Head, Dreaming The Beatles and 150 Glimpses and loved the different styles and tones of all three, especially the latter.
I did also read, as well as listened to, the Beastie Boys Book and would recommend both. The book’s art and photos are great, but the audiobook elevates the material, and is read by the most absurd cast ever, including Steve Buscemi, Elvis Costello, Chuck D, Snoop Dogg, Will Ferrell, Kim Gordon, LL Cool J, Spike Jonze, Rachel Maddow, Tim Meadows, Better Middler, Rosie Perez, Amy Poehler, Kelly Reichardt, John C. Reilly, Maya Rudolph, Jon Stewart and Ben Stiller.
A book I read about film and music and television and pop culture junk and how it all ties together was Chuck Klosterman’s The Nineties: A Book.
On Loving God had some great passages and advice, not just for Catholics.
The Swallowed Man was a fun read, the story of Pinocchio from Geppetto’s point of view (from inside the belly of the whale, no less).
“Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!” didn’t offer as much insight as I was hoping for, but it was a curious glimpse at an incredibly interesting man.
I don’t really know much about poetry but I enjoyed Rotten Perfect Mouth by Eva HD, whom I discovered after watching a film I did not care for, but the poem hasn’t left me.
Re-watched this wonderfully weird film last night and still love it as much as I did 25 years ago, but agree that it now hits different:
“Today Mark Borchardt looks less like an amusing hustler, and more like a poetic and even tragic hero; the living embodiment of unfulfilled dreams. Even that scene with the unforgiving cabinet door takes on a deeper meaning. It’s still funny, but it also summarizes the lives of dreamers like Mark in a single image. The pursuit of something bigger than yourself so often feels like banging your head against the wall. And when you bang your head against a wall, the wall always wins.”
Since Hulu launched a “top 15” list of their most popular shows and films, I decided to counter with the fifteen things currently on Hulu I’d recommend:
The Bear: Along with Ted Lasso, my favorite show right now. With how much they’ve used Wilco, they could have renamed it “I Am Trying to Break Your Heart.”
Better Things: Before The Bear or Ted Lasso, other shows had made me laugh more, but few have made me smile, cry or feel as much as this one.
Bottle Rocket: Wes Anderson’s underrated debut. Flawed, but but perhaps his funniest?
Brigsby Bear: Amusing, endearing little picture about a lot of things. I went into this fresh and think that has to be the best way to watch this so no spoilers, but if you wanna talk about Brigsby Bear I can be found at Brigsbyfan2.
Closer: Not sure what it says about me that this is one of my favorite films, but it is.
Damsels in Distress: Whit Stillman and Greta Gerwig should have made more pictures together.
Eight Days a Week: Probably the most contrarian thing about me is that I prefer The Beatles’ first half to their second.
Frasier: If we are being honest, The Dinner Parting is basically a feature-length Frasier episode.
Freaks and Geeks: Even though 21st Century comedy was born here, this brief show was even better than that fact would suggest.
Only Murders in the Building: Initially, I wasn’t sure this needed to be more than a mini series (or even a film), but it’s continued to impress.
Theatre Camp: Two-time summer camper and late-stage theatre kid who absolutely loved this film. Very funny, and perfectly cast. And I was very happy to see Alexander Bello. I think about “I Saw A White Lady Standing On The Street Just Sobbing (And I Think About It Once A Week)” about once a week.
Raising Arizona: “I tried to stand up and fly straight, but it wasn’t easy with that sumbitch Reagan in the White House.”
Spin Me Round: A dark comedy Suspiria. Saw this at Cinequest last year and everyone was in stitches, one of the hardest laughing audiences I’ve ever been in.
Welcome to Wrexham: So I like heartwarming shows about soccer, sue me.
The Wonder Years: The warmest blanket I can imagine.
Before the Internet, or at least any Internet I knew of, Siskel & Ebert was my best resource for what was coming out. By the time I hit the age where I wasn’t supposed to be seeing certain things but wanted to, those two were a gateway drug. Very few things sounded more interesting to my just-under-teenage brain than Clerks and Pulp Fiction.
I treated their year end lists like gospel. By my freshmen year of high school I walked around with and read and re-read and basically treated Book of Film the same.
For years, when I watched something, I would end up looking up his reviews to see what he thought. While I often disagreed with him, I was always interested and loved discovering films via his writing. I wonder now what he would have thought about movies that have come out since he left us. I might wonder that forever.
As Steven Hyden wrote when he passed:
“If the sum total of all the people affected by the life and career of Roger Ebert could somehow be quantified– his fellow writers were just a tiny sliver of a large and loyal readership, mind you– we might begin the process of wrapping our arms around the legacy of perhaps the most celebrated film critic who ever lived. In lieu of that, let’s just say: It’s a whole hell of a lot of people.“
I recommend looking through his work, particularly his “Great Movies” archive. Love this quote of his: “”Every great film should seem new every time you see it.”
There is also his final “top ten” list and this list of underrated films he loved, including the Up documentary series, about which he wrote:
“No other art form can capture so well the look in an eye, the feeling in an expression, the thoughts that go unspoken between the words. To look at these films, as I have every seven years, is to meditate on the astonishing fact that man is the only animal that knows it lives in time.”
Apparently this list is on the back cover of A Guide for the Perplexed. Need to pick this up ASAP.
(Via Kottke)
I often want to live in films, but seldom ones this dour. But jazz clubs in the 50s, that’s my love language. Especially when it’s shot this beautifully, this dreamy. The faux-Paris streets at night are as out of this world as the soundtrack.
Round Midnight unfolds so nonchalantly, there’s almost no exposition. Things just happen. Sometimes they’re beautiful. Often they’re tragic.
Sometimes that’s one and the same.
Dexter Gordon is brilliant. Musically, obviously, and I’m glad he and Hancock got prizes for it. But with all due respect to Paul Newman, Gordon was robbed (I’d also take Hoskins in Mona Lisa over Newman, for the record). Incidentally, Newman was in the good but incomplete Paris Blues, a story that touches on the exiled black jazz musicians of Paris, something this movie greatly expands upon. Gordon wasn’t an actor, but he lived the part in real life. That doesn’t always work but when it is meant to inflect real life pain, it sure as shit does. He plays a composite of two real life musicians, but here he’s playing himself all the same.
Based on Francis Paudras’ memoir, we find the character of Francis outside the club on a rainy night, too broke to go inside but too in love with jazz and too indebted to Dale, whose music he fell in love with years earlier, not to huddle outside and take in what he can. They form a beautiful friendship, and while one could see Francis as someone suffering from a white savior complex, that would be dismissive. He sees Dale’s talent, but he also and more importantly he sees his pain. Unfortunately he cannot reconcile how one can exist with the other. He can’t understand how someone so brilliant can’t rub two nickels together, doesn’t understand addiction, and probably doesn’t understand the black struggle. He says on the first night he hears (not sees) Dale, that he played like a God. If our gods suffer, what does that mean for us?
Since debuting on the film festival circuit, we’ve had some positive feedback on Letterboxd and a nice local blurb when we hit the Bay Area (not to mention winning the audience award for Best Picture at a Film Fest in Saulte St. Marie).
Also, not every day or even every decade I get referred to as brilliant:
“The Dinner Parting works thanks to a brilliant script by Luke Allen Hackney and director J.W. Andrew. Many writers go wrong because they aim for wacky and write weird dialogue for its own sake. Yes, this does get wacky, but a lie is rarely wasted. Like a never-ending improv sketch, every bit of information offered must be accepted as truth by our leads and cannot be denied. Hackney and Andrew then escalate the hell out of everything for the sake of rivalry, and when the bubble bursts, there’s an escape plan to take this story to another level.
The Dinner Parting is a well-executed comedy, which quite frankly is almost impossible to do in indie film. Yes, the film is mostly talking, but it’s hilarious and a clever take on a well-worn comedy trope.”
Full review here.
I haven’t spoken much about this the last two years, but I am pleased to announce that The Dinner Parting, a movie I produced and co-wrote with my longtime collaborator J.W. Andrew, will make its debut at the Cinequest Film Festival. It will start virtually April 1st, and there will be an event in-person this August. My production company, Arts & Cults, is now on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, if you would like to consider following.
“As the night wears on, stories turn ever more elaborate and the get-together goes way off its original three courses. The witty banter gets deliciously served up… in this black-and-white charmer of a throwback to films of yesteryear.” – Randy Myers, film critic for San Jose’s Mercury News.
Since it’s my birthday and I haven’t really said hi in quite some time, I figured I would answer the same questions The Bustle plans to inflict on celebrities for eternity.
What’s your coffee order?
No.
What are the saved weather locations on your phone?
East Lansing, various other Michigan cities I frequent, the cities I have visited the most (New York, Chicago, San Francisco) and Austin, a city I wish I visited the most.
What’s your sign?
I know it’s Pisces, but I admittedly don’t really know what that is supposed to say about me.
Favorite overused movie quote?
“I once thought I had mono for an entire year, It turned out I was just really bored.”
What’s one movie or TV show you’re currently obsessed with?
A Brighter Summer Day. Saw it last July and still think about it often. A Taiwanese coming-of-age set in the late ‘50s that is as much a T.E. Hinton as the War and Peace one character compares their own life to. A slightly misinterpreted Elvis lyric gives this film its (American) title, a mistake by youngsters in the film attempting to translate and understand one of their many obsessions with U.S. culture. It’s such a beautiful, sad, claustrophobic movie.
I don’t watch too many shows, but my two favorites, which I believe are both ending soon, are back on. The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel is just as funny as always. Midge and Susie still kill and the B/C plots seem a lot better as of late (or I am less of a curmudgeon than I was during the lockdown when I watched the first three seasons. That’s very likely, too). And Better Things is still just the best.
Who is your celeb idol?
It was Anthony Bourdain, and probably still is.
If you had to be on a reality TV show, what would it be?
I have a secret desire to be a picker, so if it would catapult my career...
Go-to karaoke song?
I would love to belt out an old, melancholy classic, but as such I cannot and therefore do not belt anything. Do like karaoke, though.
What’s something that’s inspiring you lately?
I finally picked up Maus last summer, and I (finally) started reading after this bullshit. I love that said bullshit brought more attention to this book and finally pushed me into reading it. I love the telling of such an incredible story in a unique way. Makes me want to learn more about the Holocaust. I am not jewish but it makes me want to learn more about my grandparents, about my mother, my and my father. I want to read more books, read more comic books, write comic books, and just write in general.
Probably doesn’t get much more inspiring than that.
What is something you would want people to say about you?
That I always did my best.
Had a conversation last night about this video from Bill Maher that I saw via a tweet from Scott Adams on this year’s Best Picture nominations, which Adams calls, “feel-bad ‘entertainment’ that gives you brain damage.” I haven’t seen all of the films (yet), but I wonder if Adams or Maher have either, or why exactly any of them would give one “brain damage?”
Maher’s argument is that movies should be less dour. I would argue plenty of movies are less dour, likely hundreds that were released last year alone.
“I’m not glad Stan Lee is dead, I’m sad you’re alive,” Maher said not that long ago, chiding those that like comic book and comic book films, and asking that grown-ups should read books that make them think. “Read James Baldwin, read Toni Morrison, read Michael Eric Dyson,” he pleaded.
Can film not do the same? If a movie can move you, or make you think, does it not hold value?
He continues, and this is the real crux of his argument, that the movies made in 2020 were not about entertainment, but virtue signaling. You can make that argument for Promising Young Women (to which I would disagree), but I can’t see that argument about any of the other nominees. (Side note: I would also argue Promising Young Women and The Trial of the Chicago 7 were wildly entertaining).
This is where he really loses me: “They used to know how to make a movie that was about something… that was also entertaining, and not just depressing,” he says while a list of films are shown on screen cherry picked from over 80 years of cinema, including Grapes of Wrath, 12 Angry Men, Look Who’s Coming to Dinner, Do the Right Thing, Schindler’s List, and 12 Years A Slave, all of which invalidate his “argument” and makes me ask:
What is it that Mr. Maher wants?
And what exactly is he trying to say?
You’re coming off the holidays. It’s cold outside. It’s snowing. Not suggesting be outright lazy for a month, but lean into the new year. You’re much more likely to set goals and keep them if you formulate a game plan.
I keep a planner and in the back pages run monthly tasks that I use as a reference as I fill in my “free time” week to week. This year I decided to be realistic and, outside of a few time-sensitive tasks, combine my “to-do” list for January and February.
I know Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow today and that means six more weeks of 2020. But if you’ve seen Groundhog Day, you know the final act is when Bill Murray decides to become the man he wants to be.
“He gets to know everybody in the town,” writes Austin Kleon. “He sees what problems there are in the town to solve, and how he can use his powers to help… He also throws himself into his work: he crafts a super eloquent speech for Punxsutawney Phil, which he presumably gives every day. He learns French. He learns how to play the piano. He learns how to sculpt ice. And it’s when he finally masters these things, when he’s turned himself into a person worth loving, it’s then that Rita notices him, and they live happily ever after. Phil learns, as Hugh Macleod says in his book Ignore Everybody, ‘The best way to get approval is to not need it.'”
If you are down on yourself for not getting shit done during the lockdown, or surprised life hasn’t gotten magically better because it is no longer 2020, or embarrassed that you have yet to start your resolutions (or never set any in the first place), I will just say this: Fuck that.
From his obituary in The Guardian:
“The film-maker and documentarian was known for films such as Gorillas in the Mist and Coal Miner’s Daughter, as well as his long-running series of Up documentaries. His death has been confirmed by his agency to the Hollywood Reporter. No further details are yet known. Apted’s career started in the 1960s on the small screen, and in 1964, he assisted on the the show Seven Up! as part of the current affairs show World in Action. He helped the director Paul Almond interview 14 seven-year-old children, and continued to independently revisit them every seven years over the course of their lives. The most recent, 63 Up, was released in 2019 and the director referred to it as ‘the most important thing I have ever done.'”
In a piece from The Nation, writer Susan Pederson notes that while the first few installments are flawed, reducing the subjects to stereotypes, there was a profound change in the films, heightened in my opinion by the longevity of the project:
“28 Up (1984) was the tipping point. The first film of the series widely screened in the United States, it was the one Apted considered a breakthrough. Only then did he realize that he wasn’t making ‘a political film about Britain’s social classes,’ but something much more unusual: an ongoing inquiry into how individuals from a wide range of backgrounds sought out meaning and happiness amid the rapid social change of postwar Britain and all the random incidents and accidents that life threw at them.”
Each film is relatively simplistic in structure, short interviews with each subject cut with footage of what they’ve been up to recently. But with each new installment, we see entire lives unfolding. Their lives force us to examine our own. It seems impossible not to watch the Up Series and not think about where you were when you were 7 and 21 and 28, or where you think you will be, or who you want to be, in seven years, in fourteen years, in thirty-five years.
And with the passing of Apted, if you will be.
Profound words: “I want my life to have meant something.”
These words on the (likely) last in the series sum things up nicely:
“The latest installment, 63 Up, is one of the series’ best, in part because the subjects are aware they’re moving into their sunset years, and in part because they also know the 78-year-old Apted may never make another one of these films. He and the people he’s been tracking for more than half a century now interrogate each other in 63 Up, speaking with undisguised emotion about what they’ve all learned from stopping every now and then to publicly take stock of their lives and their desires.”
Oddly enough after writing about this, I am reminded a year ago today I watched the 2014 dark comedy with the same name:
Pretty fucking funny. The Gods of Carnage turn a routine, man-made avalanche into something that at least looks scarier. Scary enough to knockout assumptions of security and a few gender stereotypes. Scary enough to forever scar some yuppie Swedes and ruin their bourgeois week on the slopes. Like I said, funny. You probably think you’re a better person than Tomas. Maybe you’re not.
How are you? What are you working on, artistically or otherwise? Who or what has shaped who you are? What inspires you? What do you love? Send a letter to luke@retroduck.com and let me know. These letters inspire me. I hope they inspire you, too.
I have often said, “Sundays are for worship and Netflix.” An old friend, Josh Ramirez, writes in about a different and unique way to relax and enjoy the movies on your weekend day.
Dear Luke,
Thank you for your interest in my unusual hobby. I did my first swap in October of 2019, although, I’d been thinking about it for a few months previous. I like to post pictures of my swaps on Instagram, where I get inspiration and encouragement. I decided to make a goal for myself to post a new swap every Sunday for the 2020 year (maybe beyond?). I try to coincide the swaps with events, holidays and the like (although sometimes I get ideas a bit too late). So far, I’ve been keeping up with that goal and I feel like I’m getting better at it.
As far back as I can remember, I have always loved movies. The first movie I saw at the theatre was Ghostbusters. I was a toddler at the time and was terrified yet intrigued. It is, to this day, my favorite movie. As an adult who grew up in the ’80s, I am fascinated with the technological changes in the industry. I can’t help but obsess over analog technology, though. I’ve collected music on cassette and vinyl for many years. I’ve amassed an enormous collection of VHS cassettes as well. If I had to guess, I currently own around 700 cassettes. Obviously, VHS tapes are no longer mass produced so thrift stores are my main source. Vintage horror is particularly hard to find, so I scoop that stuff up every chance I get. Ebay is a decent source if you are willing to pay. Spoiler alert: I am.
Spoolswapping is basically the swapping out of the actual VHS film spools and putting them into a new colored cassette case that better personifies the film itself. I also like to swap to cassettes that match the cover art of the sleeve. Swapping spools is a pretty simple process. Really, you only need a small screwdriver, a heat source (heat gun or hairdryer) and a glue stick. There are five tiny screws that need to be removes from the back of the cassette. You have to be careful removing the the spools and keeping the tiny components together. You don’t want to wrinkle the film or the movie might get choppy when you play it. Do the same with the other tape and swap those bad boys out!
Once you screw the cassette back together, you gotta get the label on. I use a hairdryer to heat up the label as this will make it easy to peel it off. This should be done extremely carefully as to preserve the integrity of the label. All that’s left is using a glue stick to apply the label on the new tape and you’re good to go.
In this age of streaming services, I believe that it’s important to preserve analog technology for nostalgic purposes. Also, there have been countless times where I want to watch a film, and I can’t find it on any streaming platform. When you own hard copies, you can watch whenever you please. Furthermore, it’s pretty sweet to have an aesthetically pleasing copy of said movie. That’s about it. I’m about six months in and I won’t be slowing down any time soon! I look forward to making custom VHS cassettes of newer films that were never able to see the glory of VHS. I’m excited to see what I can do going forward.
Yours truly,
Josh
Watched 322 films last year that I hadn’t seen before.
I’m usually not qualified to make year-end lists till March or so, but a few from 2019 that stood out to me thus far: Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood, Uncut Gems, Jojo Rabbit, Knives Out, Parasite, I Heard You Paint Houses, Booksmart, Us and Rolling Thunder Revue.
I made a pledge to watch at least one female-directed film per week that I hadn’t seen prior in 2019. Here they are (roughly ranked, if you’re looking for recommendations).
If you are looking to do the same in the future, or just seeking films directed by women, other favorites include The Virgin Suicides, Lady Bird, Ratcatcher, American Honey and Girlhood.
Thank you to everybody that has reached out and asked how shooting has been going. If I’ve missed you, the answer is, hectic. Possibly the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I sleep very little, and on the set’s couch because it forces me to get up and be ready bright and early every day. But also wonderful. I am so thankful and fortunate for everyone surrounding me. I’m convinced we are all making something we will be very proud of.
Realized a day or two ago: 63 Up will be coming out this year and I am tearing up just thinking about it. This series tugs at every heart string. I could barely hold it together (read: could not hold it together) just watching the trailer for the previous installment.
We should also be what, four-five years away from seeing Celine and Jesse again? I hope so. Also hope Linklater has secretly been filming something else.
… the mid/late 90s Mariah Carey/Diddy R&B/hip-hop remake must have gotten lost in a time warp.
