Good Morning, World

I don't know why I wasn't familiar with this photo of Adam Driver and Andrew Rannells on the set of Girls back in the day until this week, but I will allow it since I am at least now familiar with it. And if ever a week slash month slash year slash decade needed a boost it's this one(s). Thanks, guys.

The Jarmusch Don't Die

My feelings on the movies of writer-director-hairdo Jim Jarmusch have long been all over the place -- some I like, some I hate, but I can't say I've ever deeply loved anything he's directed. Night on Earth is probably the closest that comes to that. I'm also a fan of Broken Flowers and I seem to be one of the few who really liked his zombie comedy The Dead Don't Die. Anyway that was all true until I saw his latest at NYFF a couple of weeks ago -- click over to Pajiba to read my thoughts on Father Mother Sister Brother, the director's "rumination on the unfamiliarity of family" as I put it, which seems to've immediately become a personal fave from the white-haired iconoclast. A triptych of unrelated stories about three very different families who have had some issues connecting, the film stars Charlotte Rampling, Vicky Krieps, Cate Blanchett, Tom Waits, Adam Driver, et cetera et cetera -- Jim Jarmusch can get whoever he wants and he usually does. Krieps gives my favorite turn in the film but then she often does -- thank you Paul Thomas Anderson for the gift of Vicky! FMSB is out in U.S. theaters on Christmas Eve; here's the recently dropped trailer:

Tahar Rahim is So Alpha

This week has been wild with excellent movie news and today's getting off to another excellent start with the word that Raw and Titane director Julia Ducournau has lined up her next movie and it will star our boyfriend Tahar Rahim! It's to be called Alpha and it's described as the director's "most personal, profound work yet" but that's it, that's all they're giving us. Oh and it will co-star actress Golshifteh Farahani, who was in Jim Jarmusch's Paterson with Adam Driver and the Extraction movies with Chris Hemsworth and most importantly of all she was in Asghar Farhadi's fantastic 2009 film About Elly -- if you've never seen that one seek it out immediately. Farahani and Rahim have that in common -- he starred in Farhadi's film The Past, which was also wonderful. If you're gonna cast your movie casting it with Farhadi alumni ain't a bad way to go!

The Gang Goes Gobble Gobble

There is very nearly too much out this week for me to even keep a handle on, but lemme try real quick, before I take off for the evening. I always say before a holiday that I might pop back on here to update things and then never do -- of course now that I have said I never do I probably will because there's nothing I love better than proving myself foolish. Well that's not entirely true -- I also really love being lazy. So it's a battle between those two to see which wins out!

Anyway -- lotsa movies is my point! Many of which I have already reviewed or will have reviews going up for sometime this week. But let's start with a movie that falls into neither of those categories -- Rian Johnson's Knives Out sequel Glass Onion, which I saw last night (see down at the bottom of this post for some video of Johnson and a choice friend introducing the movie) but which I have no plans to review. It's hitting some theaters this week and y'all should go, it's fun. I'm not these movies most enthusiastic fan but they're fun enough. I thought the endless cameos in this one were a little much, but I am after all joyless and dead inside so your mileage will probably vary.

Seeing Jack O’Connell’s cock at this point is like having an old friend pop by for a spot of tea

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) October 29, 2022

Oh and another movie out this week that I have seen but don't plan on reviewing is the new Lady Chatterly's Lover with Jack O'Connell -- even though I'm not writing about it doesn't mean it's bad, though. I liked it well enough. And not just because what I tweeted above. Although, you know, that never hurts. Literally never.

As for movies that I have already reviewed that are hitting theaters this week -- most importantly there is Luca Guadagnino's cannibal romance Bones and All, obviously. Here is my review of that. I think it's awesomely good and think you should see it. It got some Indie Spirit nominations today which surprised me -- I really think the film will be too weird for awards. But good for the Spirits. (Also I might have a piece coming on this exact subject hitting some time soon as well.) And then also out this week -- although only here in NYC, I think -- is Noah Baumbach's White Noise, which I reviewed right here. It's also terrific! Greta Gerwig, baby! They dropped a trailer today, too:



As for movies that I have reviews posting later this week -- keep your eyes trained on Pajiba for my takes on the films Devotion with Jonathan Majors and Glen Powell, as well as Steven Spielberg's autobiographical fable called The Fabelmans. Maybe I will pop back in here and share those links this week when the links arrive... maybe not. It's the most exciting thing that will happen all week, this guessing game! Make sure you hold your breath! Even when you're eating mashed potatoes. Especially when eating your mashed potatoes. Happy Thanksgiving, everybody! (And don't forget to use MNPP's Amazon link to do your holiday shopping with!)

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Four From NYFF

A slew of my first reviews out of the New York Film Festival hit the 'net yesterday whilst I was in more press screenings of New York Film Festival movies all day long so I can write more reviews -- the film fest cycle is really something y'a.. Anyway I haven't been able to link to all of these reviews properly yet -- unless you keep track of my Rotten Tomatoes page -- so let's do that! First up here at Pajiba is my review of the fest's Opening Night film, Noah Baumbach's White Noise, starring Adam Driver and Greta Gerwig in an adaptation of Don DeLillo's "unadaptable" 1985 novel. I was a bit dazed when I walked out of this one but by the time I sat down to write about it my opinion had cemented better than I anticipated.

Next up here at The Film Experience is my review of the surgery documentary De Humani Corporis Fabrica from the duo filmmakers behind Leviathan. This movie got a lot of understandable walk-outs as it's filled with microscopic close-ups of real live human bodies being dissected and smashed and probed and everything you can imagine, but I found it hypnotic and contemplative and fascinating. I haven't been able to stop thinking about it.

Thirdly I will send you over to my review of Kelly Reichardt's triumphant reunion with muse Michelle Williams in the art-world observational Showing Up, which you can read right here again at The Film Experience. As I said on Twitter...

I just wanna live in the world the way Kelly Reichardt sees the world

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) September 27, 2022

I cannot overstate how much I love watching Kelly Reichardt movies, I really can't. Anyway lastly for today is another fantastic outing -- although this one far more cutting than anything Kelly Reichardt would ever, could ever, attempt -- here is my review at Pajiba of Todd Field's Tár starring a maybe never better Cate Blanchett. The rumors are true! She's astonishing in this. Given what she's gifted us with in the past it seems crazy to be contemplating a new peak, but here we are.

Good Morning, World

Happy Monday, one and all and horses and Adam Drivers and everybody, just everybody. Like the orange cat sagely said I too hate Mondays so let's let me ease into this thing delicately by sharing these three new photos of Adam Driver for Burberry that dropped (via) last week -- these join the previously posted images from this campaign that we saw like last year? Five years ago? I have no concept of time. All I know is it's a Monday today and I hate those! Hit the jump for the other two photos...

5 Off My Head: The Great and Powerful Greta

Today we wish actor writer director extraordinaire Greta Gerwig a happy 39th birthday! If I was a smart person -- big if -- I'd hold off on doing this post for another twelve months and ring in her 40th with this... not to mention that'll be just a couple of weeks after her seemingly inexplicable Barbie movie comes out! But I feel like, you know, it's that thing where you don't know if the world will be around in a year? Yeah that thing. So I will do this now. What is "this" you ask? it's a list of my five favorite film performances by Greta, that's what. It's been too long since she's graced us with her wondrous screen presence -- six full fucking years, that's how long! The only movie she's been in since 20th Century Women was Wes Anderson's Isle of Dogs and that was just voice-work. Of course that is thankfully all about to change with Noah Baumbach's adaptation of White Noise out this fall...

... which, speaking of, NYFF just announced that movie is opening their fest on September 30th! And that there above is the first photo of her and Adam Driver (plus Killing of a Sacred Deer star Raffey Cassidy alongside I am guessing Alessandro Nivola's son Sam behind her? And maybe that's the other Nivola child May behind Greta? I love that Alessandro and his two kids all have roles in this movie.) (But where's Alessandro? I wanna see Alessandro!) Anyway that's a big thing to look forward to coming right at us. Until then we take stock of Greta Past, with...

My 5 Favorite Greta Gerwig Performances

Frances, Frances Ha

"I'm so embarrassed. I'm not a real person yet."

Brooke, Mistress America

"I don't give a shit because I'm not

a friend of Tennessee Williams!"

Florence, Greenberg

"I was thinking this morning that I've been

out of college now for as long as I was in, and

nobody cares if I get up in the morning."

Megan, The House of the Devil

"We're just dropping you out here

in the middle of where ever..."

Abbie, 20th Century Women

"Whatever you think your life is going to be like,

just know, it's not gonna be anything like that."

Runners-up: Damsels in Distress, Wiener-dog,

Baghead, Hannah Takes the Stairs

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What are your favorite Greta Gerwig roles?

Happy John Waters List Day!

Tis the happiest time of the year, when our dad John Waters releases his Top 10 Movies list for Art Forum! You can see the list right here -- as per usual it's a mix of high and low low low brow, with perfectly Waters-ian compatriots like Leos Carax, Bruno Dumont, Gaspar Noé, and Bruce La Bruce all making appearances. And as per usual there are titles included that I've never even heard of (I think that final entry on his list he probably got sent a personalized screener from the director) and ones that I hate -- I just couldn't with Annette (here's my review) but it doesn't surprise me at all that John liked it. It seems his taste...

They'll Continue Singing It Forever Just Because

At some point in The Sparks Brothers, Edgar Wright's recent documentary on the art-pop band Sparks, one of the brothers that make up the band talks about the importance of repetition in their songwriting. They like to lyricize an entire song with one phrase, one phrase repeated over and over, but sung slightly different each time so its meaning shifts ever so slightly. Change the emphasis inside the sentence "We love each other so much" just a hint and a grand declaration can become an ironic half-thought, a sinister accusation. 

And that's the well their score for Leos Carax' sixth film Annette -- recent opener for the Cannes Film Festival, now in theaters, hitting Amazon this weekend -- returns to time and again and again and again... and again again. Indeed nearly every song seems predicated on the idea. Or maybe that's just the way it felt to me by its end -- either way at a certain point Brechtian echoes trail off, leaving blank emptiness in their wake, and I fear Annette, for all its blowsy Carax-fueled cinematic abandon, might suffer the same fate. It's a lot of sound and fury, in other words. Actually in the same words. Over and over, and again again.

Admission of dire un-hipness I had never even heard of Sparks until Edgar Wright told me that I needed to, and at Sundance his two-and-a-half hour doc, bubbling with giddiness, sure convinced me I'd been missing out -- I went straight to Apple Music and I downloaded all of their music immediately, coasting in on the doc's effervescent charms and the mad wild weirdness of those legendary brothers. But the spell, I have to say, kinda wore off, and fast at it -- within a couple of months I was swiping their tracks off every playlist, as that same repetitive nature of their songwriting began to eat away at itself; a poisonous stomach-ache hangover, an acid bath for my ears. Novelty wore thin and I became actively annoyed by the sound of them! Egads, outta my head!

To the new film's credit it's only the opening scene of Annette where the exact "sound" of the Sparks themselves becomes an issue, since it has the brothers marching and singing alongside all of the film's actors (and hey there Mr. Carax himself) to introduce our big handed tale of woe -- its forward camera march is reminiscent of the standout accordion scene in Carax's masterpiece Holy Motors actually. And from there on the duties of being incessantly repetitive are handed to some admittedly talented thesps, foremost being Adam Driver & Marion Cotillard as our dangerously romantic couple -- these two, they have some luck for awhile with it. 

But I've said on numerous occasions that I can only stomach musical movies as far as I dig their soundtracks, and the Sparks music eating away at the heart of Annette went the same road as my whisper-brief affair with the band themselves -- an iota of them goes a long long way, but Annette insists on going longer.

Visually Carax remains a trip, a touch of light fantastic, a treat -- he finds such weird ways to render mundane material that you can't help but sizzle here and there in your seat from the Sheer Audacity TM on display. But about film's mid-point, as Adam Driver's performance grew bigger and more exhausting as if he could outrun his every sentence, I began to get lost in the Whys of it all. The story boiled down to its core is standard Star in Born claptrap, goosed up with ever bigger waves of ham and extravagance -- eventually I just wanted the ride to end. I wanted off the whirlygig. I wanted these white people to please stop screaming at me.

There are a lot of things about Annette to appreciate, in theory. It's not sanded down for its abrasiveness -- it's dark and glum and mean and horny and relentlessly idiosyncratic. It will be a lot of people's cuppa. You do admire the chutzpah while wiping it off your face. But I just couldn't find a heart to it anywhere -- a belly to sink my hand into for firm grip. It was shock and awe and marionette drone sight gags, a giggle or ten, and a lot of operatic wailing in the place of words or meaning. Sometimes saying the same thing over and over just makes the thing lose all meaning, a word on a page that's turned into scribbles, a hieroglyphical dissonance half-resembling a thing you once remembered, back in the before-times, whenever the hell they was, when they was, whenever.

O What Music Adam Driver's Torso Makes

Holy Motors maniac I mean director Leos Carax's highly anticipated musical movie Annette, starring Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard and the music of the band called Sparks -- recently enthusiastically profiled by the filmmaker Edgar Wright in a documentary of their own; massive year for Sparks fans! -- is out in theaters on Friday, and they've just dropped the final trailer which you can see below. 

I have already seen this movie but I'm saving my review (which quite unlike me I have already written) for a bit, because the movie's out on demand on Amazon Prime on August 20th and I'd rather encourage y'all to see it that way -- in the middle of a damn pandemic -- than to go to the theaters, quite frankly. Now a wise person might here note that I had no such qualms about reviewing The Green Knight, a film I adored, and this wise person might then wonder if this means my like for Annette is less than... as I said, that would be a wise person. But we'll get into that later this month! Whether Adam Driver likes it or not!

Today's Fanboy Delusion

 Today I'd rather be...

... barebacking with Adam Driver.

Burberry didn't put a saddle on that horse 

precisely so we could make that joke, I know it.

ETA oh wait there is video too; I've added it 

and one more new photo after the jump...

Quote of the Day

"The part of Abbie was just enough beyond me so that I was always chasing it, out of breath and thrilled. I wasn’t sure if I was any good, which made me feel very alive, which is how I think one should feel making something always, whether as an actor or a director or a songwriter, though I don’t know because I’ve never written a song. Mike’s process of filmmaking invited us all to live in that space of not-quite-certainty. His films are so clearly from him and part of him and his distinct voice, but he continually gives it to his collaborators for them to own and reshape. I don’t know what the inverse of a dictatorship is, but Mike directs like that..."

-- That's just a small passage from the essay that Actress turned Director Greta Gerwig penned for the gorgeous hardcover book that A24 announced last week for Mike Mills' 2016 masterpiece 20th Century Women; the entire essay has been posted on Nylon's website, read it here (thx Mac), for those of us who don't have the sixty bucks to drop on the book (god I wish I did though). Still can't believe that's the last time Greta acted -- five whole years! But we don't have long to wait for her to act again -- just this week she's been spotted alongside Adam Driver shooting Noah Baumbach's adaptation of Don Delillo's book White Noise! Here's a grainy photo:

Yeah I have no idea what to expect, I still haven't read the book. I should move it to the top of my book pile, terrifying teetering thing that it is. Anyway lots of Gerwig news this week -- sounds like there's forward momentum on her movie about the little plastic lady Barbie, set to star Margot Robbie, as it was reported last week that'll definitely be her next directorial gig. That's not until next year, but it is actually happening. How weird! Maybe Timmy can play Ken...

Some more Golden Timmy sightings in Cannes pic.twitter.com/hJjshnlUFB

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) July 12, 2021

Adam Driver Scores Big

Yikes it's taken me all day to get to this -- been working on a piece elsewhere, I have -- and I'm sure you and you and you and the next one have already watched the trailer for Annette, Leos Carax's long-awaited Holy-Motors-follow-up musical starring Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard... but I'm posting it anyway, dammit. I don't want to be talking about this movie in the future -- and I will inevitably be talking about this damn movie in the future! -- and not have a trailer to link back to, timeliness be damned. Oh and did I mention the music is by Sparks? I can't feign coolness on the subject of Sparks -- I only found out about them thanks to Edgar Wright's excellent forthcoming doc which screened at Sundance. But now I consider myself a fan, so better late than cool, or however that saying goes. 

Also announced is that this film is what's opening Cannes this year -- that's happening on July 6th and Amazon (who owns the movie) says it'll then premiere for the rest o' us in "Late Summer" in both theaters and on streaming. So there, a thing to look forward to. Holy Motors (which I reviewed here) was my second favorite film of 2012 (after Moonrise Kingdom) and to say I'm looking forward to this would be an understatement. (Also I can't believe it's been nine years!) Lots of gorgeous crazy visuals in that trailer anyway! Of course I only giffed the Sexy Adam Driver moments though cuz duh. 

Greta's Back, Baby

While I know she's been super busy writing and directing and being nominated for Oscars (not to mention NOT being nominated for Oscars she SHOULD have been nominated for) and birthing babies and being on the cover of Time Magazine and listening to Noah Baumbach bitch over breakfast and being a genial-enough lightning rod for conversations about White Womanhood I have still, all that shit aside, been holding out hope against hope that my beloved Greta Gerwig would do that thing that made me fall in love with her all those many many years ago, she knows what thing. So do you. The acting thing. That thing. It's been FOUR YEARS since we've seen her blessed face on-screen, four years since she gave one of her best turns in Mike Mills' masterpiece 20th Century Women. Okay...

... she did voice that strangely afro'd Wes Anderson character between then and now but that doesn't much count, entertaining as it might've been. So yesterday's big news, involving yes her husband and yes her husband's on-screen avatar slash Star Wars Action Figure, and yes the big-screen adaptation of a famous book by a beloved author, is really to me all about her. Greta Greta Greta! The news anyway is that she's going to co-star opposite Adam Driver in  Noah Baumbach's White Noise, adapting Don Delillo's 1985 book. Here's the book's synopsis off Amazon:

"White Noise tells the story of Jack Gladney, his fourth wife, Babette, and four ultra­modern offspring as they navigate the rocky passages of family life to the background babble of brand-name consumerism. When an industrial accident unleashes an "airborne toxic event," a lethal black chemical cloud floats over their lives. The menacing cloud is a more urgent and visible version of the "white noise" engulfing the Gladneys-radio transmissions, sirens, microwaves, ultrasonic appliances, and TV murmurings-pulsing with life, yet suggesting something ominous."

I'll just admit I haven't read White Noise right upfront, although yes, I'm poseur enough that I ordered a copy online within minutes of hearing this news yesterday. But what do y'all think of the book? And these people attaching themselves to the book? The film is supposed to shoot in July.

GRETA GERWIG IS GOING TO ACT AGAIN
2021 IS THE GREATEST YEAR OF OUR LIVES

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) January 14, 2021

Little Green Men, Big Criterion Package

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I didn't even realize today was New Criterion Announcement Day! What a thrill when this showed up in my inbox! Today Criterion's announced their titles for this July, and yes, you guessed it, it's a killer batch of eclectic awesomeness per the exquisite monthly routine. Up top you see they're dropping the 1953 sci-fi classic The War of the Worlds from director Byron Haskin -- have I ever told you guys how I had nightmares for weeks after seeing this movie as a very small child? The scene where the aliens are creeping around in the basement done Little Jason in, and hard. This disc will have a brand new 4K restoration -- I can't wait to see how those greens green and those reds red -- along with the typical tonnage of special features, including the original Orson Welles radio program that tipped the world on its axis in 1938. Next up...

... just one of the greatest film comedies ever crafted, Preston Sturges' 1941 classic The Lady Eve starring Henry Fonda and the queen, my queen, your queen Barbara "Babs" Stanwyck in possibly her greatest role. I should probably rank Stanwyck roles some time? I coincidentally just re-watched Ball of Fire yesterday...

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Watch BALL OF FIRE, smile pic.twitter.com/R1fdLCOMWe

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) April 14, 2020

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... and that one gives this one a run for its money, but The Lady Eve is the better made film overall. You can't go wrong with Sturges. This disc will also get that 4K restoration plus all the extras you can cram into your teeny tiny purse to carry on a steamship where you'll romance a hapless kajillionaire by pretending to be your own double. It's the screwballiest!

Other titles that Criterion is dropping in July -- a massive boxed-set of Bruce Lee movies, Noah Baumbach's Oscar-winning Marriage Story (that was fast!), and Abbas Kiarostami's Taste of Cherry, which I have never seen. For someone who thinks Certified Copy is one of the greatest films of the new millennium I have actually seen way too few Kiarostami films -- that's what I ought to be rectifying during these quarantine weeks, dammit.
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And Now the Men Take a Turn...

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I've been covering the best performances from actresses in 2019 for the past several weeks at The Film Experience, which I wrapped up last week with a Top 10 -- I hadn't intended to do anything this week as I'm in chocolate-smeared middle the much-needed laze-about, but I decided to force myself off the floor for a few minutes (lest I get floor-sores) and make up a bonus list today, so if you click on over to TFE today I've given us my 10 Favorite Horror Actor Performances of the year. At least three of them were real real easy, and I bet you can guess which three...

The Rise of Tight Pants

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I suppose it's antithetical to post about something when I'm avoiding something but hey, I'm just like any other man, and I just wanna look at Oscar Isaac in tight pants. (Sidenote: our pal Manuel interviewed Oscar recently and the tight pants came up... so to speak) Point being I'm not seeing the new Star Wars until Sunday and I'm neither in a huge rush nor terribly enthusiastic about it, but I'd prefer to not get it spoiled. It's just, I realized this week... do people really give a shit about any of these new characters? I like the actors obviously, but these characters -- and yes I include weepy man-baby Kylo Ren -- all read as wafer-thin to me. I recall some visuals from the last couple of movies -- Last Jedi was flat out gorgeous -- but where those characters were emotionally? That's like footnotes. I mean... I don't know what I expect. It's not like Luke & Leia & Han were exactly bastions of depth. Sorry am I murdering everybody's childhoods right now? I'll shut up and make it better:

Someone captured Oscar Isaac fixing Pedro Pascal's collar and We'll Never Be The Same pic.twitter.com/If7ICw9Qbs

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) December 19, 2019

I Can't Spell Away This Hurt

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My father showed up at my elementary school sobbing one day to drag me out of my third grade classroom. I hadn't seen him in months and I had made it my mission statement to refuse to -- as an adult one is supposed to say that "he'd left my mother for another woman" but to that kid there in that classroom, head down and stomach sick every day, my father had left the both of us. Friendships withered on the vine, my mom and me were for all intents and purposes homeless -- I wasn't too concerned with his feelings while his pregnant fiancée-to-be-once-the-paperwork-went-through lingered in the background, a triumphant scowl on her face.

How much of that was me and how much of that was the me my mother had weaponized? Every day I was told what a monster my father was, and he surely was -- it was impossible not to believe it, then and now, looking back on how he skipped our court-enforced visitation dates whenever he felt like it, leaving me sitting on the curb like a pre-teen jackass. I had my feelings and I stood by them, my own triumphant possession -- three and a half decades later I stand beside them, them pressing in at all sides. This rupture, this wood beam buckling at the base of me, shattered and reshaped my foundation -- my mistrust and disillusionment, my cynicism and timidity, self-consciousness, baked into the meat of my person. I am all of their mistakes poured into human form.

It was impossible not to drag this human shaped shape along with me into the theater with Marriage Story, Noah Baumbach's funny and emotionally brutal spin on, as Tammy Wynette phonetically euphemized, D-I-V-O-R-C-E. Baumbach also spells out the hurtin' words, one excruciatingly paused letter at a time -- all the better to draw the process out unto everybody's rictus-grinned oblivion, insane tears smattering their eyeballs, the only place such ruptures feel nice and comfy and at peace. Home is where the broken hearts are, whether half a town or an entire country apart -- there's no going back to the people we were before what happened happened, and all we can do is walk around on our legs like living things for awhile, until we don't. If somebody will tie our shoes for us as we do all the better but we'll no doubt stumble through either way.

But even though I can't help but instinctively look at D-I-V-O-R-C-E through a kid's eyes Marriage Story isn't too concerned with its kid's point of view -- Henry (Azhy Robertson) is a tousle-haired pain in the ass; a football with vaguely nudged toward feelings that everybody wants their hands on, an instinct Baumbach can't help but turn into a bit of a punchline. He already told this story from the kid's point of view once with The Squid and the Whale so he gets a pass, and as Ray Liotta's character says at one point all Henry is saying is what his parents want to hear anyway. This one's for the (semi) adults in the room.

As such it's warm and generous beyond my personal capabilities towards its big folks -- Marriage Story spins back and forth, side to side, batting at the impossibilities of this stupid love affair even as it caresses, softly, its every hard curve and selfishly jagged edge. That's a lot of learning what being a grown up is, anyway -- learning about the importance of selfishness in this world. About how much is too much and how much is just right; how much space our human shaped shapes are allowed to take up, and how much we expect everybody else's to take up around us. We make room for our individualized disasters, or we don't. There's always another empty place to punch a hole through and start, as they call it, fresh.

Know From Adam

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Well here's a thing you and me can read here on our lunch breaks -- I write this as my dripping-with-snow miniature pizza just got delivered to my office and yes, I tipped well -- and said thing is Adam Driver's new cover store for Rolling Stone magazine, at this link. I hope they talk about Marriage Story some and it's not just Star Wars because nobody can actually talk about Star Wars beforehand, which makes for a boring read. A sexy brooding red-and-black photo-shoot, sure, but a boring read. Speaking of the shoot hit the jump for more...

The One Where Adam Driver Wins An Oscar

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I didn't get the chance to write up Noah Baumbach's Marriage Story when I saw it at NYFF a couple of weeks back since our pal Murtada was assigned that review -- read his thoughts here -- and I had my own duties to plow through, but I'm hoping to write one in November in between when it hits some theaters on the 6th and it drops onto Netflix exactly one month after. So stay tuned. If you follow me on Twitter you did get an inkling of my (unpopular) opinion already though...
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Pretty sure this is one of my least popular opinions but I'm never gonna get why Randy Newman is venerated, his scores are hokey* and distracting, and he's the only thing keeping me from calling Marriage Story perfect

*this worked in the case of Pleasantville

— His Name Was Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) October 5, 2019

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Anyway the latest poster (seen above) and trailer (seen below) have gotten dropped on our goofy faces this here very day, and that's what we're really here about. Watch, luxuriate, appreciate and enjoy, before Adam Driver wins his Oscar:

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