Posted on October 22, 2010 at 8:16 am
Enjoy this peek at one of the best films of the year, a sexy, touching, whip-smart romance with Jake Gyllenhaal, Anne Hathaway, Hank Azaria, and Oliver Platt, written and directed by Edward Zwick (“Glory,” “thirtysomething,” “Legends of the Fall”), opening next month.
Posted on October 20, 2010 at 10:46 pm
A Family Affair is a documentary about the unforgivable. And the power of forgiveness. Film-maker Chico Colvard has made a powerful film about his own family’s tragedy and their journey toward reconciliation and understanding. Those in the Washington, D.C. area can see it on November 8 at the Johnson Center Cinema at George Mason University. Colvard will be there for a Q&A following the film.
Posted on October 20, 2010 at 8:00 am
The scariest — and most infuriating — movie of the year is “Inside Job,” the documentary about the financial meltdown from Charles Ferguson, the director of “No End in Sight.” With just two films, Ferguson, a PhD in political science who made a fortune in software, has become an extraordinarily accomplished director and journalist and an important participant in the conversation about definitional issues of policy. His films are exceptionally well-crafted. He has a true story-teller’s understanding of the material and, as his interviews of the friendly and not-so-friendly subjects of this film demonstrate, a fearless intellect and a gift for getting to the point — all of which made interviewing him a rare treat.
I have done a great deal of research myself on the subprime portion of the financial meltdown and I believe a core problem was that everyone at every stage of the Wall Street conveyor belt, had incentive compensation that was all upside and no downside — they all got paid for success with no risk of loss for failure. Is that what you discovered as well?
These people were rewarded enormously for doing the dangerous things they did and even on a net basis, despite the losses they suffered when their firms collapsed, they made more money then they would have if they behaved ethically. Harvard Law School professor Lucien Bebchuk’s study on executive compensation at Bear Stearns showed that it created incentives for excess risk.
I think it’s unquestionably correct at several different stages and several different levels in the system, beginning with the yield-spread premiums that lenders paid to mortgage brokers which incented mortgage brokers to put people in more expensive and more dangerous loans than they should have going all the way up to the structure of trader and sales and CEO compensation in investment banking, which are all exceptionally dangerous and give people huge incentives to take risks and/or commit fraud, both of which occurred on a gigantic scale. Even the nature of director compensation and corporate governance — the directors are essentially paid to be passive and to not challenge entrenched management.
How would you describe what went wrong?
Large-scale fraud became a core part of the financial system — a combination of deregulation and lack of enforcement of the law.
One of the big differences between the financial crises of the Enron/WorldCom era and the more recent one is that no one seems to be going to jail. Why is that?
The reason that they’re not going to jail is not that they didn’t commit crimes. It’s because there’s been no effort to enforce the law, an even more disturbing phenomenon.
What’s the solution?
The American people have to get angry enough and organized enough to force our political leaders to change. At the moment it doesn’t seem at all likely that it’s going to come from the current administration. It’s been a great disappointment that it’s turned out to be more of the same. And so far the American people have been remarkably quiescent in the face of this, given what’s occurred. I hope that that’s changing. There are good guys but they’re not organized. There’s no Chamber of Commerce for the good guys. That’s what we need, whether it’s a political party or some non-profit/lobbying organization that coordinates — there are a number of organizations but they are very scattered and divided.
How can Washington stand up to Wall Street, given the amount of money they spend on lobbying and campaign contributions?
Wall Street has certainly become very powerful. It’s depressingly the case that politicians are inexpensive to purchase. Three things are critical — changing the role that money plays in elections, paying regulators very well, which some countries do, like Singapore, which gives them no financial incentive to move to or give favors to the private sector, and third is law enforcement. One of the least well covered in media terms developments related to this is the politicization of law enforcement for white collar crimes.
As they say, if you rob a bank with a gun, you go to jail; if you rob a bank with a pen, you get to keep your job and your bonus.
And that’s a change. After the S&L crisis, many people went to jail. Now no one goes to jail.
Who should have gone to jail?
All of the major investment banks artificially concealed their liabilities, most of them inflated the value of their assets for quite a long period of time. We also know all the major investment banks were heavily involved in selling securities they knew to be defective and in many cases designing them to fail so they could bet against them or allow their clients to bet against them. In principle it’s possible to do those things without violating the law but as a practical matter it’s hard to sell hundreds of billions of dollars of those securities without committing fraud. If you’re honest and you don’t lie and you don’t commit fraud, it’s a tough sell. We know that Goldman Sachs executives were referring to these as “s***y deals” at the same time that they were selling them as very safe securities. I suspect that a very high fraction of the senior sales forces, the senior people on the mortgage tests, the senior mortgage traders, the senior management of the investment banking industry should be prosecuted.
What is the hardest part of explaining all of this to frustrated and angry Americans, where so many people feel that the system is unfair but whose eyes glaze over when they hear “credit default swaps?” How do you reach the people you want to get angry?
Keeping the jargon out and getting to the essence of things, not letting the jargon overwhelm you. We wanted to make the film interesting and accessible for the average person. We used good cinematography, cool images, great music, pacing, to make it appeal to the audience. I hope that many, many people will see this film.
You were a serious film fan before you became a film-maker. What are some of your favorites?
There are serious ones and silly ones. I love film noir, “The Maltese Falcon,” “The Big Sleep,” the newer incarnations like “LA Confidential.” I love heist movies. “Inside Man” I thought was great. And serious things, too: “Kagimusha,” “Ran.” My friend Jason Kohn’s movie “Manda Bala” about corruption in Brazil is beautiful, amazing. It’s about crime and corruption in Brazil and it’s gorgeous, really extraordinary. It’s so unusual in the way that it is visually gorgeous. It was made in anamorphic Super 16, 2.7 to 1 so a standard DVD will not do it justice. It’s really breathtaking.
Are documentaries the agent for social change the way Dickens was in the late 19th century and journalists like Upton Sinclair and Rachel Carson were in the 20th century?
It’s not the only place investigative journalism gets done these days but journalism is shrinking, and under a lot of pressure. Documentary film is taking up some of that slack and I hope it will become increasingly prominent.
Posted on October 19, 2010 at 8:00 am
Forget about “Star Wars” and “Aliens” — there are creatures living beneath the waves on this very planet that are far weirder and more exotic than anything Hollywood has conjured up.
Huge, swooping creatures with bright speckles; shape transforming beasts that pounce and gobble up crabs; gelatinous monsters that glow; all this and more is captured in “Oceans,” from Disneynature.
The documentary is accompanied by a narration by Pierce Brosnan which sometimes gets overly flowery, but at its best adds an element of poetry to help young audiences understand that there is a larger significance to the images they are seeing. “Oceans” also offers a message of concern about pollution and the environment (appropriate for its Earth Day release). But the star of “Oceans” is clearly not the words but the pictures, and they are worth the price of admission many times over.
Scenes of the predatory side of ocean life are kept to a minimum, and are usually shot from a tasteful distance. There are cute moments — a sea otter floating on it back in the sunshine at Monterey bay keeps a rock on its stomach, to use in cracking open the shellfish it gobbles up– and tender moments– an ugly mother walrus sweetly nuzzles her even uglier baby walrus, or a mother seal coaxing her baby into the water for the first time. The cameras of directors/writers Jacques Perrin and Jacques Cluzaud do a good job of conveying the vast range of the ocean, by contrasting the powerful crashing of immense waves in a storm with quiet glimpses of delicate life forms suspended in the tranquil depths; they contrast huge whales with tiny one celled creatures.
Posted on October 16, 2010 at 8:00 am
Stephen Simon grew up in Hollywood, the son of a movie director and studio executive. He worked in movies as well, including films with Tom Cruise, Madonna, and Christopher Reeve. His new book is The Old Hollywood and he was nice enough to answer my questions about the movie business.
What’s the biggest difference between the “old Hollywood” and the “new Hollywood?”
The single biggest difference is that New Hollywood is almost entirely focused on films for people under thirty; that is, those who are experiencing Act One of life. The Old Hollywood focused on Acts One, Two, and Three of life. When we bring back the Old Hollywood, we can leave Act One to the New Hollywood and focus on Acts Two and Three.
Are there some film-makers who work with the same crews and cast repeatedly to create the old Hollywood sense of community and continuity?
As to key crew members, yes. Most filmmakers like to work with the same core crew. As to cast, only a few people like the wonderful Christopher Guest (“Best in Show,” “Waiting for Guffman,” etc.) maintain a kind of rep company so he can work with the same actors. There are other ways that some directors honor the Old Hollywood. Many years ago, I worked with Sam Raimi who went on to direct the Spider-Man films. In honor of an Old Hollywood tradition, Sam wore a coat and tie on the set every Friday.
How does the increasing role of the international box office affect the subject matter and script quality of Hollywood movies?
I have heard some foreign sales agents say that “action rules, comedy drools.” Action films translate all over the world but humor often doesn’t. In addition, international distributors put a huge emphasis on so-called “name” actors so they can have a better chance at DVD and television pre-sales. So, action films with name actors have ruled the international marketplace for many years. Doesn’t leave a lot of room for films like “Sideways,” “Little Miss Sunshine,” and other story-oriented films, does it?
What can independent producers do that studios cannot?
Nowadays, not much. Sadly, “independent” today usually means out of work. One of the biggest casualties of the New Hollywood has been the decline of independent films. In fact, one of the main goals of my book Bringing Back The Old Hollywood and www.TheOldHollywood.com is to prevent independent movies from becoming an extinct species.
Why are movies all directed at teenagers?
I address this woeful state of affairs in my book: Murder At MGM. The corporate mentality that now rules every studio has also led to a single-minded reliance on Madison Avenue demographics. Whereas the giants like Mayer and Thalberg would make films they believed in and order their marketing divisions to come up with ways to sell them, the situation is reversed today.
Marketing executives are consulted on whether the under thirty year-old audience can be lured to theaters by a film. If the marketers are dubious, the film will, in most cases, never see the light of day.
If Indiana Jones were sent to find The Holy Grail in the New Hollywood, his assignment would be to come back with the secret of how a fifteen-year-old boy decides which movies to attend over and over again.
Imagine for a moment Louis B. Mayer in a meeting with his MGM marketing team about Gone With The Wind in 1939. The head of marketing cautions Mayer not to make “Gone With The Wind.” “Sure, it’s a big best seller and all, Mr. Mayer, but the teenagers will never go for it and there are no fast food tie-ins.” The next day’s headline in Variety would have been: “MGM’s Mayer Murders Marketer.”
The tail is not wagging the dog. It has replaced the dog altogether.
Do you agree with the “auteur” theory that it is the director who is the author of a film?
Absolutely, positively, 100% not! One of the reasons that the New Hollywood is in so much trouble is that it has so marginalized writers and canonized directors. Screenwriters are hired and fired indiscriminately. As a result, the majestic power of story telling has become a lost art in the New Hollywood. And that’s another reason that we’re Bringing Back The Old Hollywood.
What is it like to vote for the Oscars?
It’s a wonderful honor and also a significant responsibility. So much Oscar voting is about politics, personalty, and jealousy. 2009 is a perfect example. While “The Hurt Locker” was admired by many, “Avatar” is one of the great achievements in film history. The only reason James Cameron didn’t win was because many people in the Academy felt the film’s success was a big enough reward and others were just jealous of Cameron’s success. Politics aside, being a member of the Academy is a great honor for which I am deeply grateful.
When did you say no to Steven Spielberg?
Well, for one, I’m obviously no genius. The story is related in great detail in my book but, in short, Spielberg was at one time interested in developing a script for “What Dreams May Come.” For various reasons, I eventually decided to go in another direction. It’s one of the more interesting and bizarre chapters both in my book and also in my life.
What do you mean by niche being the key to bringing back old Hollywood?
The New Hollywood is on a relentless hunt for movies that appeal to the widest possible audience under 30. As one studio executive said to me, they are no longer even looking for films that could be modest or even solid successes. They want blockbusters. (The fact that the video chain Blockbuster is itself teetering on bankruptcy seems lost on them.) Niches have been the key to cable television’s meteoric rise at the expense of the so-called mainstream networks and it is the key to making films for targeted audiences over 30 as we Bring Back the Old Hollywood. In fact, if the classic film “The Graduate” was made today, the word whispered to Benjamin as the key to future success would be “niches”, not “plastics.”
