"In part one of Parallax Views on The Parallax View, noted film historian Joseph McBride gives his thoughts on The Parallax View (1974) as well as to discuss the film in the context of the Kennedy assassination, the Nixon Presidency and Watergate, and the rise of New Hollywood. He also offers some personal stories about The Parallax View‘s director Alan J. Pakula, discusses the technical aspects of the film such as the lauded cinematography done by Gordon Willis, and much more." Reviewing films depicting political assassination conspiracies for The Guardian, director Alex Cox labelled The Parallax View the "best JFK conspiracy movie". Film critic Matt Zoller Seitz has called the film, "a damn near perfect movie". It has an approval rating of 89% on Rotten Tomatoes. Joseph McBride: I asked him Alan J Pakula during the making of All The President's Men if he had heard, based on information I had been given by a friend who was an RFK assassination researcher, that journalist Bob Woodward was a covert ONI or CIA agent. Pakula's actual reply to me was, "I've heard that, but if I think about it while making this movie, I'll go crazy." His comment to me on Woodward shows his savvy but the limits of how far he wanted or could go. Billy Wilder's The Front Page from 1974 can be read as a satire of the media frenzy over Woodward & Bernstein and is a strong indictment of the callousness and dishonesty of the press; Wilder had worked as reporter during his Vienna and Berlin days and saw through some of the Washington Post's fabrications. I think someone should do an honest film about Woodward & Bernstein. My friend Rod Lurie, a former film critic who is now a writer-director—I helped get him into the LA Film Critics Association after he was blackballed for having suggested a remake of All The President's Men.
Tuesday, March 09, 2021
The Parallax View on Criterion Collection
Friday, March 05, 2021
Con-Artists: "I Care A Lot", "Uncut Gems"
Monday, March 01, 2021
2021 Golden Globes, Rosamund Pike (I Care a Lot), The Mensch Comedy (Palm Springs)
2021 Golden Globe Awards Winners:
Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Drama: Chadwick Boseman (Ma Rainey's Black Bottom)
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Drama: Andra Day (The United States vs. Billie Holiday)
Best Performance by an Actor in a Limited Series or a Motion Picture Made for Television: Mark Ruffalo (I Know This Much Is True)
Best Performance by an Actress in a Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television: Anya Taylor-Joy (The Queen's Gambit)
Best Motion Picture and Director: Nomadland (Chloé Zhao)
Best Screenplay - Motion Picture: The Trial of the Chicago 7 (Aaron Sorkin)
Best Motion Picture - Animated: Soul
Best Motion Picture - Foreign Language: Minari
Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Comedy: Sacha Baron Cohen (Borat Sequel)
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Comedy: Rosamund Pike (I Care a Lot)
Wednesday, February 24, 2021
Luckiest Girl Alive (Mila Kunis), Promising Young Woman (Carey Mulligan), Andy Samberg
Wednesday, February 17, 2021
'Can't Get You Out Of My Head' by Adam Curtis, Kerry Thornley and Lee Harvey Oswald
Sunday, February 14, 2021
Happy Saint Valentine Day, Palm Springs
EXT. DESERT TACO STAND - DAY
NYLES: (he laughs) It turns out I’m not really into dudes.
Nyles gathers their burrito wrappers and tosses each of them over his shoulder across the patio, directly into the trash. Source: www.indiewire.com
Friday, February 12, 2021
Oliver Stone's JFK: Destiny Betrayed will debut on Cannes Film Festival, Sons of Camelot (JFK Jr.)
Wednesday, February 10, 2021
Palm Springs, White Guilt, Homo Americanus
Wednesday, February 03, 2021
Imperialism, Junk Economics and Global Fracture
Financial takeover of industry, government and ideology:
Almost every economy is a mixed economy – public and private, financial, industrial and rent-seeking. Within these mixed economies the financial dynamics – debt growing by compound interest, attaching itself primarily to rent-extracting privileges, and therefore protecting them ideologically, politically and academically. These dynamics are different from those of industrial capitalism, and indeed undercut the industrial economy by diverting income from it to pay the financial sector and its rentier clients. One expression of this inherent antagonism is the time frame. Industrial capitalism requires long-term planning to develop a product, make a marketing plan, and undertake research and development to keep undercutting competitors. The basic dynamic is M-C-M’: capital (money, M) is invested in building factories and other means of production, and employing labor to sell its products (commodities, C) at a profit (M’). Finance capitalism abbreviates this to a M-M’, making money purely financially, by charging interest and making capital gains. The financial mode of “wealth creation” is measured by the valuations of real estate, stocks and bonds. This valuation was long based on capitalizing their flow of revenue (rents or profits) at the going rate of interest, but is now based almost entirely on capital gains as the major source of “total returns.” Stock prices have largely become independent from sales volume and profits, now that they are enhanced by corporations typically paying out some 92 percent of their revenue in dividends and stock buybacks.