In case you didn’t notice, sex was hot at this year’s Cannes Film Festival (though a relatively chaste if politically-loaded film, Ken Loach’s The Wind That Shakes the Barley, did win the Palmes d’Or). But sex doesn’t seem very popular with the Chinese State Administration of Radio, Film and Television. This censorship board ordered all members of the Chinese press to ignore Lou Ye’s competition entry, Summer Palace. It seems the director never got permission to enter the film, and the board post facto said it was unacceptable, because of “lighting and sound flaws.” Politics always is a no-no for the Chinese censors, but this time they were steamed by the graphic sex and references to the hot button topic of Tianamen Square. But more than the politics it was the full frontal nudity, the first in any Chinese film, that got them hot and bothered. They say when he gets back home Lou can probably expect a five year ban from making films.

I don’t know if Summer Palace has gotten a U.S. distributor yet or not, but I wonder how it might fare with our own censorship board, the MPAA. NC-17? Maybe not. The ratings board these days seemsmore interested in political content (I think they’ll approve of what Lou has to say about Tianamen) than about naughty bits, thus reversing the trend of their Chinese colleagues.

That’s the case in their recent decision to forbid a poster designed for Michael Winterbottom’s The Road to Guantanamo, the based-on-truth tale of three British citizens who ended up in the U.S terrorist prison. It's already made a stir with the authorities after premiering earlier this year (see previous postings) at the Berlin Film Festival. In this instance the board found the image of a blindfolded man hanging by his shackled wrists unacceptable. According to Howard Cohen, co-President of Roadside Attractions, the film’s U.S. distributor,  “The reason given was that the burlap bag over the guy’s head was depicting torture, which wasn’t appropriate for children to see."

Oh, and the lighting and sound were a little off, too. What is appropriate for children to see, according to the MPAA? Well, you might scroll down to find a previous posting on this blog showing the lighthearted image promoting Hostel, or check out these  posters for Saw and Syriana.

5/29/2006 2:30:54 PM by Peter | Comments [0] |  

Not that it takes much, admittedly, but the recent big fuss over The Da Vinci Code has put me in an apocalyptic mood. To be more specific, I’ve been thinking about Mel Gibson’s new movie Apocalypto. I wasn’t the only person who wondered what was going on when he decided to follow up his near-billion dollar grossing Passion of the Christ with an action flick set during the Mayan civilization in Mexico in 900 AD.

True, it had the subtitle thing going for it — the dialogue is entirely in the ancient Yucatectic-Maya language. But what does the bloody decline of a pagan civilization 600 years before there was even a bible in the New World have to do with beating the crap out of Jesus?

And what’s the deal with Gibson dissing President Bush? “The fearmongering we depict in this film reminds me a little of President Bush and his guys,” he recently told Time magazine. And then his Icon Productions company has agreed to produce a six-hour mini-series for USA about Iraq called Peace Out, which is described as a “MASH-like dark comedy.”

 I thought the guy’s politics leaned a little to the right of Grand Inquisitor Tomás de Torquemada. Now he’s starting to sound like Michael Moore.

Speaking of whom, wasn’t it Gibson’s Icon company that had originally backed Moore’s Fahrenheit 911 before suddenly pulling out of the deal? The reason being, according to Moore, was that “they had got a call from top Republicans to tell Mel Gibson don't expect to get more invitations to the White House.”  Be that as it may, after the 2004 People’s Choice Awards at which both directors  received honors, Gibson said, “I feel a strange kinship with Michael. They're trying to pit us against each other in the press, but it's a hologram.  However, what the hell are we doing in Iraq?”

Who might “they” be, you ask?  As Gibson’s paranoid taxi driver puts it in Conspiracy Theory, “What do we know? If I know what we know then I could tell you what we know and if anyone else knows!”

One place to look for answers might be the Popul Vuh, the Mayan “Bible” that has provided Gibson and co-screenwriter Farhad Safinia with inspiration in the making of the movie. According to Hector Carreon of La Voz de Atzlan (“a totally independent news service”), “many of the Old and New Testament Biblical prophecies of the ‘End Times’ correlate amazingly with the religious beliefs of the Mayas and other indigenous civilizations of the Western Hemisphere.”

No doubt they both share the concept of the Antichrist. I don’t want to jump to conclusions, but could Gibson be suggesting that the Evil One might be none other than George W?

He wouldn’t be the first. Numerous websites, at least one book and perhaps even Pope John Paul II  have made the case. One titllating account has Aleister Crowley impregnating Bush’s grandmother, siring his mother Barbara (or is she really the ex-Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge?), making George the son of “the Great Beast 666” himself. And a poll
from around the time of the last Presidential election has 30% of respondents identifying Bush as the Antichrist (to be fair, 21% said it was John Kerry, 4% said it was Michael Moore, 3% fingered Brittany Spears and 1% said it was Gibson himself).

I guess we’ll  just have to wait for the remake of The Omen to come out on 6/6/06 to sort things out. Meanwhile, I suspect along with many others that the real explanation for Gibson’s Blue State leanings might be related to the box office. It doesn’t take a book of revelations to figure out the right side to take on someone with a 29% approval rating.

5/23/2006 6:44:15 PM by Peter | Comments [1] |  

Before you start feeling bad about the Catholic Church undergoing an assault on the very foundations of its belief system with the release of the film adaptation of The Da Vinci Code, consider this: it sure has drawn attention away from news stories about pedophile priests and million dollar payoffs to  victims of abuse. For this distraction alone the whole phony controversy is a p.r. bonanza on a par, if not with Pope Urban II kicking off the First Crusade in 1095, then at least the huge success of Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ in 2004.

No matter how you look at it, the Church can’t lose.

First, the purprtedly blasphemous film and book’s popularity and its perceived threat to the institution will serve to motivate the Church’s base of believers to renewed diligence, faith and proselytizing in much the same way that Karl Rove will be stirring hardcore Republicans to action against the Blue Peril of the Democrats in the upcoming election. Moreover, it will cast the Church in the role of a victim for a change, and not a victimzer.

Second, the Church can exploit the renewal of interest in matters spiritual sparked by the book and film by using it as a lure into its own teachings. An article in today’s New York Times decribes “the prevailing strategy” has been “to hitch on to the Da Vinci steamroller and use it as an opportunity for evangelism.”

Recently, though, perhaps jealous of all the press the Muslims have been getting for burning down embassies protesting the Muhammed cartoons, some Church and other Christian groups have called for more dramatic measures, such as boycotts,  encouraging people to attend other films, such as Over the Hedge, which is presumably devoid of blasphemous material. “The movie being an opportunity for evangelism is a line completely concocted by the Sony Pictures marketing machine,” says Barbara Nicolosi, a proponent of that tactic. “All they care about is getting the box office.”

No shit, Barbara, and here it looks like it’s a case of one hand washing the other. Every ten bucks spent is another soul that probably otherwise wouldn’t be pondering eternity and the role of Christ in the world today. But if they want to go the boycott route, I think the Sony people can work with that, too. As the millions subjected to the old Legion of Decency lists of proscribed movies can attest, there’s nothing like getting  a “Condemned” rating to get a good Catholic boy or girl eager to see a movie.         

Here’s a case in point: In Rome, Church officials complained about  a big poster for the film near the Vatican. So city officials had it  covered  over with a big black cloth. What more of a come-on do audiences need? They pay people at Sony big bucks to come up with marketing ideas like that. The bottom line after all the noise from the “offended” Church hierarchy? The picture is already sold out for its openings in such Catholic enclaves as Italy, Spain and Mexico.

Boy, that should make the folks at Opus Dei upset. They’ve demanded that the film begin with a disclaimer that their organization is not a murderous secret sect of sado-masochists bent on suppressing the truth and taking over the world. Director Ron Howard has scoffed at that, saying that “spy movies don’t start off with disclaimers.”

They certainly don’t if the disclaimer gives away the only real twist the film and book have left to offer. [Spoilers!] Here’s The Da Vinci Code’s dirty little secret: Opus Dei are the good guys (well, maybe a little over-idealistic and mislead)! The real villains are the whack jobs who fanatically believe in all the Da Vinci Code conspiracy nonsense! So pardon me if I think the Church complains a bit too much, and that the real conspiracy is between those two great opiates of the people, Hollywood and the Church, once again playing the masses for chumps.

5/11/2006 7:22:42 PM by Peter | Comments [5] |  

A few weeks ago in this space I expressed some concern that the upcoming 9/11 movies — United 93 and World Trade Center — might effect the upcoming Congressional election in November. I figured they would probably benefit the beleaguered party in power, since the only asset they have to exploit these days to is the blind anger and fear over that outrage. So when Paul Greengrass, the director of United 93, came to town for interviews promoting the flick, I asked him whether the film had any political intent or potential impact on the races. “Honestly, I don’t have a view on that,” he said. “I would hate for this film to be drawn into a party political debate.”

The people at Universal marketing the film, however, don’t seem as fussy. According to an article in the May 1-7 issue of  Variety  they offered preview screenings to a number of conservatives, including Rush Limbaugh, weeks before the release. “We showed it to a lot of people,” a spokesperson remarked. “It seemed like it would be a natural fit, if they do endorse something, they have a large following...”

Turns out Limbaugh did indeed have a natural fit after he watched the meticulous, real time recreation of the tragic flight.  “The overwhelming emotion I had was sheer anger at the terrorists, bordering on hatred,” he said. “This movie is going to refocus, for those who see it, the exact reason we are in the war on terror.”

That’s what happens when you don’t have the oxycontin to take the edge off. If we indeed did refocus on the exact reason for the war on terror we might get angry instead at the bumblefucks whose incompetence, as United 93 makes clear, made us vulnerable in the first place, and who have since hypocritically used their own fuck-up as an excuse for every excess and idiocy of policy that’s followed. It’s refreshing to note, moreover, how blithely venal the studio is in pandering their film to whichever side they think can sell the most tickets.

5/5/2006 6:10:27 PM by Peter | Comments [0] |  

Tomorrow millions of American’s will waste their money and time on Mission Impossible 3. I won’t be one of them. Here are some reasons why.

1. National security. In a publicity stunt perhaps more creative than anything that appears in the film, Paramount rigged Los Angeles Times newspaper boxes with devices that would play the Mission Impossible theme when unwitting customers opened them. Apparently some, seeing odd wires protruding and noting that the country is currently at war with terrorists, called the cops and reported a bomb.The La Times people (and I wonder what kind of review they will be giving the film?) explained that they wanted to turn “the everyday news box experience” into “an extraordinary” mission. A visit from the bomb squad will do that. It will also prepare audiences for the bomb they will be paying ten bucks to see.

2. Anti-Phoenix sentiments. At a press conference for Tom Cruise’s last film War of the Worlds  our dauntless Phoenix writer Gary Susman dared to ask if a particular element of the film had been inspired by the writings of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard. Nonplussed, Cruise expressed ignorance of our publication and asked Steven Spielberg, the film’s director sitting next to him, if the Phoenix was any good. Spielberg, to his credit, admitted that it was.

3. There’s no Tom in Team. The original Mission Impossible TV series from the 60s distinguished itself by emphasizing the team nature of the IM force. Each member cooperated equally to pull off a resolution that was often ingenious, ironic and highly satisfying. Here, the other members hold Cruise’s coat while the placenta-eating, couch-vaulting, grinning lemur of a religious crackpot pulls off ridiculous, boring prima donna stunts himself.

4. Grotesque misogyny. A recent story in the Wall Street Journal described MI3’s marketers’ dismay that female fans might be put off by their star’s recent antics and comments. Among other concerns: Cruise’s feud with Brooke Shields over her taking drugs to combat  post-partum depression. His scary relationship with Katie Holmes who seems a victim of the Stockholm Syndrome. His manic endorsement of Scientology’s “silent birth” method in the delivery of their child. Not helping matters — the female bashing plot twists in the film itself as reported by our reviewer, Brett Michel.

5. Lousy acronym. MI3? That’s not the name of a movie. That’s the name of a disposable razor.

6 They don’t care if I see it anyway. This is another movie that the studios insisted on screening late — a few days before the opening (unless you’re a privileged local TV critic who will remain nameless), too late for weeklies such as the Phoenix to file their reviews in time. So, big deal, you say. We can rely on the TV and newspaper puff pieces gushing over the star and the movie to judge whether we want to see it or not.

I’m sure many more reasons will come to me. In fact the only reason I would see the film is for Philip Seymour Hoffman as the villain. Apparently, though, he’s wasted in a handful of tossed off generic scenes. My recommendation would have been for Hoffman to play his character in his Truman Capote persona, reducing Cruise to a gibbering, furious homonculus as he lambastes him with brilliantly acute insults and bon mots at a cocktail party.

5/4/2006 4:05:32 PM by Peter | Comments [2] |