Gods, Monsters, and Showboat

The great James Whale is getting a one-week retrospective at New York's Film Forum starting tomorrow. What fun--the Frankensteins, The Old Dark House, The Invisible Man, and, beyond the macabre, his legendary filming of Showboat (with Paul Robeson and Helen Morgan), The Man in the Iron Mask, and one of the strangest screwball comedies, Remember Last Night?, which really boggled me when I saw it on TCM earlier this year. All this plus Ian McKellen's Oscar-nominated performance as Whale in 1998's Gods and Monsters. It's a Whale of a week (puns and wordplay; my only weakness...).

Beyond the Canon

Now here's a film list I can get behind. A few months ago I was asked to participate in an effort to determine the next 100 best films of all time, beyond the standard 100. This was a compelling undertaking that the indefatigable Iain Stott committed to, and it makes for fascinating reading. The list is here; and here are my choices. 1934's The Black Cat (pictured) made it onto my list and the official one. Now go see some movies.

The horror of Cineaste

A special focus on contemporary horror films is a big part of Cineaste this edition, and I'm pleased to have played a part in bringing it to Frankenstein-ian life. Articles in the magazine are a critique of Saw and "torture porn," a look at the chaste vampirism of Twilight, and my friend and colleague John Calhoun on Let the Right One In and other childhood terrors. Online you'll find an interview with Re-Animator and Stuck director Stuart Gordon, Richard Harland Smith's authoritative viral history of zombie movies post-Night of the Living Dead, and my own roundup of horror movie books. "To avoid fainting, keep repeating...it's only a magazine...only a magazine..."

The month in theater

From Live Design: Finian's Rainbow and Superior Donuts on Broadway, and The Age of Iron and Wolves at the Window Off. Pictured are Finian's stars Kate Baldwin and Cheyenne Jackson.

My Popdose Top 50 list

Here's my Top 50 picks for Popdose. Would it be a different list if Cineaste went in for this sort of thing? Is it really a "best" list, or more of a "favorites" list?

1. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (pictured)
2. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
3. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
4. Pan's Labyrinth
5. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
6. Brokeback Mountain
7. Hero
8. Almost Famous
9. Sideways
10. Spider-Man 2
11. The Hurt Locker
12. Casino Royale
13. Let the Right One In
14. Donnie Darko
15. Ghost World
16. 25th Hour
17. Adaptation.
18. Traffic
19. Shaun of the Dead
20. The Devil Wears Prada
21. Zodiac
22. Yi Yi
23. Memento
24. No Country for Old Men
25. Ratatouille
26. Man on Wire
27. In the Realms of the Unreal
28. The Son (Le Fils)
29. High Fidelity
30. The Pianist
31. The Queen
32. Grizzly Man
33. Lost in Translation
34. X-Men
35. Michael Clayton
36. Iraq in Fragments
37. Gosford Park
38. Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
39. Gladiator
40. Catch Me if You Can
41. Moulin Rouge!
42. Dogville
43. The Lives of Others
44. I Heart Huckabees
45. The Hidden Blade
46. The Host
47. Volver
48. A Scanner Darkly
49. Elegy
50. Jackass: The Movie

Of that TIFF list, incidentally, I most highly value In the Mood for Love, Tropical Malady, The Death of Mr. Lazarescu, 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days, Elephant, The World, and, from Canada's irrepressible Guy Maddin, the hilarious My Winnipeg and his superb short The Heart of the World.

Blind Sided by list broadsides

A Hollywood Elsewhere post on the popularity of The Blind Side drew the following response from filmmaker George Hickenlooper, who is best-known for the short film that became the indie hit Sling Blade (1996): "I know [Blind Side writer-director] John Lee Hancock. Our sons were on the same Pasadena T-Ball team. John is one of the great ignored and underrated Hollywood writer/directors. His films hearken back to the golden age when movies were about telling stories and not narratives littered with characters being quirky and snarky to titillate the postmodern sensibilities of the effete New York literati. The polarity of tastes that has grown between the so called fly-over states and the two coasts is not the consequence of the dumbing down of the Midwest, but rather the infantilization of New York and Los Angeles. Where high art has become confused with the puerile masturbatory self examination of stone dead emotional detachment and characters who no longer mirror real life but are rather created to titillate the cynical sensibilities of critics who have seen too many movies and are no longer emotionally engaged with reality."

Is that the taste of sour grapes being spat out at the critics, in New York and elsewhere, who dismissed Hickenlooper's stone-dead biopic of the emotionally detached Edie Sedgwick, Factory Girl? Perhaps. But Hickenlooper is getting at something more nagging than a defense of the journeyman director of The Rookie (Dennis Quaid) and The Alamo, now enjoying his first $100 million-and-counting blockbuster.

Popdose printed its Top 100 movies list last week. A reader, who I think spotted it at The Auteurs.com (and who I think I may know from Dave Kehr's blog, harrumphed at the pop, Hollywood-centric nature of the post and proposed a "better" list, from TIFF Cinematheque. This set off a fiery exchange of posts, with me--who works both sides of the street, Hollywood and for lack of a better word "world" cinema--stepping in like Toshiro Mifune in Yojimbo to oversee the bitch-slapping. Look: I disagreed with a fair number of the Popdose choices, at least a few of which were prankishly made. But as I said during the exchange the TIFF list also left something to be desired--too parochial, too joyless, and, maybe, too snootily elitist, heavily weighted toward subtitled auteurist fare that's lucky to play two weeks in allegedly cosmopolitan New York.

But they're both fine. It's not a death match; co-existence is possible, and, indeed, necessary. A Hollywood-exclusive diet is too heavy on junkfood. But a "world cinema" one is entirely too rarefied. The Hollywood-only crowd needs guidance to select the best of what else (and there is much else) out there, but trumpeting lists of the usual, almost pre-approved suspects as somehow superior isn't the way to go about it, cinephiles. (Hey, the Popdose list has more of the TIFF films than vice versa.) Everyone needs to sample both flavors--and, when it comes time to make one of these lists, choose from both these menus (and others besides as the movie market continues to fragment). Or just give up this artificial "best" pose and pick favorites, which isn't the same thing but is maybe less predigested and more idiosyncratic.

So let's join hands, sing "Kumbaya," and head off to the movies--maybe a double feature of The Headless Woman and The Blind Side, one a movie I need to see, and the other the first film in years of former gal pal Sandra Bullock that I may actually see at the theater.

Bean Off Broadway

Unseen in New York since 1932, Sidney Howard's The Late Christopher Bean has been resurrected by TACT. A review for New York Theater News.

Popdose: Movie cornucopia this Thanksgiving

And on the flipside: Not just DVD reviews of the sequel Angels & Demons and the Criterion release of the excellent Gomorrah, but a countdown of the Top 100 films of the decade, as compiled by our editors. What's on top? Hint, it's not Precious, but the precious...

Popdose: Movie misery this Thanksgiving

This is the dreariest turkey day selection of movies ever--partly because they're lame (a sequel to the so-so teenpic Twilight doesn't get my blood pumping) but mostly because they're so goddamned depressing--Precious (pictured), The Road, etc. Try not to kill yourself after reading this piece.

Popdose: Downhill Racer on DVD

Robert Redford on skis, in Michael Ritchie's debut feature. Does the Criterion disc cross the finish line?

Popdose: Wings of Desire on DVD

Wim Wenders' 1987 hit Wings of Desire has been reissued as a Criterion Collection title, just in time to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the fall of one of its principal locations, the Berlin Wall. Is it a transporting experience?

My own Wall fall story: I was living in Hong Kong when the momentous event occured. I was about to rent a new apartment. The prior tenant of the place (which had a glorious little view of the harbor) was a German woman who was returning to the country in tremendous haste--so fast, she asked me to please take all her furniture. I offered her some money but she said, no, it was OK, I was doing her a favor by letting her leave all the stuff behind. And off she went. The German people got their freedom, and I got free Ikea furniture that I owned for years.

The new Prisoner

I'm hoping against hope that the reimagined Prisoner, which starts up on Sunday as a six-hour event, won't be too bad. AMC will always have a black mark in my book for trashing its movie programming but someone there must know something given the quality of Mad Men and Breaking Bad.

Though I own the Patrick McGoohan original on DVD I haven't really spent much time with the show since I gobbled it up on PBS years ago. But I've certainly read about it since then, not least in Video Watchdog magazine, and I remember it fondly. It was one of those shows that helped me grow up, to look at the world differently.

Not so, says the new No. 2, Ian McKellen. In a New York Times piece, the actor more or less calls the original, well, No. 2. “I thought it was camp, frivolous, something without substance, an entertainment without any weight or bottom to it,” he said. “I thought McGoohan was tremendous. He was terribly good at playing enigmatic, clearly angst-ridden and suffering, edgy and sexy too. It was all designed to intrigue and delight. But what was under the surface? Was there something?” Mr. McKellen added that he “wouldn’t have wanted to play the original, because it would just be playing a caricature, an idea, a symbol.”

But symbols have great power--more than too easily caricatured "reality," which is what I fear this soapier-looking redo, replete with backstory and the actor who played Christ, will amount to. McKellen's a smart guy, and a good blogger, and his emergence as a bankable character actor has been most welcome. (Then again, it seems that all British actors have to do is wait for the offers to come in from across the pond, as they do eventually.) He knows the value of publicity by going a negative; I'm sure Prisoner and TV chat rooms have lit up with his comments. But we'll soon see if he lives up to his hype and shows us what's under the surface.

Mad Men and dinosaurs

In the grip of last night's third season finale of Mad Men, I had a dream. I dreamed that the show was excellent--and that I was really happy that there was only scene with dinosaurs. My gripe with the show had been that there was too much focus on dinosaurs, and I was pleased that--finally!--the producers had gotten it down to just one scene. I recall Don Draper and a T-rex hanging out together in a Jurassic Park setting.

What was going on here? Perhaps my sleeping self had somehow wired Mad Men and Primeval. Or maybe I was reacting to the notion that the modes of behavior in the show are extinct (or, like birds, have simply evolved). Perhaps I was nostalgic for a time in my own life when the idea of a workplace as a substitute family was appealing--does anyone think that way now? (Don's Manhattan family, dysfunctional as it is, is a lot more fun than the one collapsing on him upstate.)

Don't know. But I teared up at Don and Peggy's big scene. Television--dramatic art--at its finest. This show, at least, is far from an ice age in quality.

Popdose: The Men Who Stare at Goats

Is it worth you staring back? Read my mind.

Popdose: DVD knockouts

TKOs this week: Costa-Gavras' Oscar-winning "Z," from Criterion, and a hard-hitting Samuel Fuller box set that includes the DVD debuts of The Crimson Kimono and Underworld U.S.A.

The biggest losers

Clearly New York mayor Mike Bloomberg, who won tonight, but not by much. The term limits shenanigans cost him, and all the money he threw at the election couldn't buy him a mandate. Expect a typically bumpy third term that tarnishes whatever legacy he's built up, then, I trust, out.

Second biggest loser: Me, for buying the atrocious Lionsgate DVD of an old favorite, John Huston's last film, The Dead (1987). The thing's apparently missing 10 minutes of footage, no surprise, really, given the label's careless handling of catalog releases. But I got burned.

UPDATE:

From Dave Kehr's blog:

A brief interruption for a public service announcement. For those of you who may have purchased the new DVD of "The Dead" that apparently dropped a reel of the film, Lionsgate would like to make things right. Here's the release I just received:

It has come to our attention that due to a technical malfunction, the initial DVD shipment of John Huston's THE DEAD contained an incomplete version of the film. We deeply apologize to all our consumers for this unfortunate error and want to offer them an opportunity to replace their current copies with the complete version as soon as it is available to ship the week of November 23rd. We regret this inconvenience, as Lionsgate is committed to providing our consumers the highest quality home entertainment experience.

All consumers who purchased a copy and wish to receive the new complete version should do one of the following:

• EMAIL lionsgatecs@orderassistance.com with their address and a scan/attachment of their receipt
• FAX (310) 222-5562 with their address and copy of their receipt
• MAIL their receipt along with a note including their address to: 20102 S Vermont Ave Torrance, CA 90502

Or please call (800) 650-7099 directly if you have any further questions.

But Lionsgate will not be recalling Bloomberg.

UPDATE: My corrected copy of THE DEAD arrived Dec. 17.

You axed for it!

In a still from Strait-Jacket, Joan Crawford wishes all readers a Happy Halloween.

Let's hear it for 560 State Street

Jay-Z filmed the video for his new single "Empire State of Mind," the hip-hop "Theme from 'New York, New York'," here at the "stash spot" last month. You can see us from :28-:33.

Happy Horror-ween!

Presenting on Popdose: A consumer's guide to horror on DVD, including "The William Castle Film Collection," The Stepfather, Audition, and a new favorite that's bloody good, Trick 'r Treat.

Christopher Lee knighted...

...and Roger Corman's winning an Oscar. Wonders never ceasing.

Popdose: Antichrist

Chaos reigns.

Live Design: Bye Bye Miss Julie

It's a Roundabout world that we live in: the revival of Bye Bye Birdie (pictured) at the restored Henry Miller's, and the Strindberg "revisal" After Miss Julie at the American Airlines.

RIP Joseph Wiseman

I imagine Wiseman preferred the stage to film and TV, but he took time off from the boards long enough to get the Bond series off to a great start, adversary-wise, in the title role of Dr. No (1962, pictured). He's splendidly cool and silky in the part, and has rarely been bettered for onscreen villainy. Other memorable film roles included 1951's Detective Story, recreating a stage success, and an acid-etched portrayal in Sidney Lumet's Bye Bye Braverman (1968)--when he tells his son he hates him, he means it. (The Night They Raided Minsky's, too.) It's hard to believe his only accolade was a Drama Desk Award for his performance in the 1969 show In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer, but he made the work look so effortless. I was pleased to see him in his final Broadway appearance, in the 2001 play of Judgment at Nuremberg.

RIP Vic Mizzy

One of those days again, with multiple passings to report...Mizzy's TV themes for The Addams Family and Green Acres certainly brightened the tube whenever they came on, and he brought his offbeat sensibility to films for Don Knotts and William Castle's The Night Walker (1964), too. "Two finger snaps and you live in Bel-Air," he remarked of his creepy kooky success.

Popdose: Cheri on DVD

Dangerous Liaisons director Stephen Frears, screenwriter Christopher Hampton, and star Michelle Pfeiffer reteam, this time for an adaptation of Colette. But was Cheri worth getting out of bed for?

Who, me?

I see that The Auteurs has named this little slice of the web one of its Best Film Sites. Honored and humbled to be in such great company.

Popdose: Where the Wild Things Are

Spike Jonze makes a 100-minute movie from Maurice Sendak's short, sharp children's classic. Is it really wild, or merely mild? This week at Popdose.

Live Design: The Royal Family

Checking in on a handsome Broadway revival, and another drop-dead gorgeous John Lee Beatty set. Rosemary Harris, Jan Maxwell, and John Glover (who I met afterwards) star.

Lithgow loony again

I don't like Dexter. But I do like John Lithgow playing crazy people, so I'm tuning in for its fourth season. He plays the Trinity Killer, who murders in threes according to a carefully maintained pattern, and has done so for years. He's set to cross paths with Michael C. Hall's serial killer vigilante, who with a wife and kids to support is feeling restive. I find the premise of the show distasteful, dislike the clammy Hall (I wasn't over the moon about him on Six Feet Under, either), and fast-forward through everything involving the negligible supporting characters (except for returning guest star Keith Carradine, who looks great in his tailored suit and brings the right gravitas to his role of a not-so-retired detective tracking Trinity).

But mostly I'm watching for Lithgow, a favorite actor whose Broadway appearances are usually top-notch (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels) and who often plays eccentric, as on his long-running TV hit 3rd Rock from the Sun. No one plays out-and-out insane like him, though. Blow Out, Twilight Zone: The Movie,Buckaroo Banzai (pictured), Ricochet, Raising Cain, Cliffhanger--I love them all. Thus far he's shown an interesting reserve on Dexter, even when slashing a woman in the tub and forcing another off a ledge, but after all those years away I'm sure he's just picking up the scent again.

RIP Lance Berry

We never met, but I'll miss my Popdose colleague's passion for film; he was especially keen on science fiction, something we bonded over in our e-mails and online exchanges. A tragedy--gone too soon.

Popdose: An Education

A star is born as Carey Mulligan receives An Education, in a new memoir-based drama penned by Nick Hornby (High Fidelity). Tutoring her in life and love are Alfred Molina, Cara Seymour, and her co-star in last fall's revival of The Seagull, Peter Sarsgaard.

Through the looking glass

The harvest moon has yielded a bumper crop of retrospectives.

The Brooklyn Academy of Music has just kicked off a "Hungarians in Hollywood" festival that runs through Oct. 27. Bela Lugosi as Dracula of course but also an eclectic mix of Hungarian hand-crafted entertainment, including Paper Moon, Gilda, and Blow Out.

Love him or hate him, Elia Kazan made some legendary movies, which Film Forum is celebrating with a three-week retrospective that begins tomorrow. Viva Zapata! is hard to find these days, so it's worth checking out. Also highly recommended: The delightful Baby Doll (with one of the best closing lines in film history, Tennessee Williams at his finest) and the more-valued-by-the-year Wild River, which gets a one-week run.

The folks at Subway Cinema have the skinny on the Film Society of Lincoln Center's latest "Scary Movies" fest, which runs Oct. 12-22. I had a great time at the first one some years back. The original, accept-no-substitutes version of The Stepfather (pictured) is in my DVD review queue for Popdose.

New York Theater News: Hamlet

Jude Law is a not-so-melancholy Dane in the play's (and the actor's) first Broadway appearance since 1995. To be or not to be?

Henry Hewes Design Awards noms announced

Quite a slate of nominees this year, for behind-the-scenes talent that sets the stage so well. Shrek the Musical's set and costume designer, Tim Hatley, is in good company this year.

Live Design: A Steady Rain

The forecast calls for stars on Broadway, as Daniel Craig and Hugh Jackman play Chicago cops in A Steady Rain. Plus: A couple of Off Broadway shows, at the Live Design website.

Star crossed

On my way to Broadway last night to see Daniel Craig and Hugh Jackman in A Steady Rain (good show, spare, lurid) I walked into the tail end of a video shoot Jay-Z was having outside our lobby. (As that part of the world that cares about Jay-Z knows, this his former "stash spot," as mentioned in one of his new songs.) Beyonce tagged along and made it up to our courtyard. A crowd of on-lookers enjoyed the show.

Assuming our signage makes it into the video we'll have international renown; already, Lora said a vote taker, when seeing our address on Tuesday, exclaimed, "That famous place!" Unimpressed was Larissa, who was in transit with her dad for a pre-theater hand-off with mom; she showed her disapproval with celebrity culture by throwing her bottle on the train tracks when we got into the station. (More amused than annoyed, I sensibly let it go.) She's the real diva.

Face the music

I've read all about the crime, the circumstances, the flight, the forgiveness, and the capture. I saw the documentary. I question the fairness and impartiality of justice then and now. But I also wonder if the politicians and artists who have leapt to his defense have really thought about it, just as I wish the knee-jerk hang 'em high brigade would give it greater consideration. So let's have it out. It's time for Roman Polanski--a great filmmaker, but as fallible, and as liable for our actions, as the rest of us--to face justice.

For all his trademark bluster and patented pot-stirring, Hollywood Elsewhere columnist Jeffrey Wells has done a good (if typically hysterical) job laying out his opinion, which is shared by others. To wit:

"I also said that Polanski (a) has suffered more than half his adult life in terms of his career and income having been limited and because he's been psychologically living as a fugitive, exactly as he did as a child during World War II, (b) it should be over and done with due to the victim having pleaded with everyone to please drop it, (c) it's a discredited case due to a lack of prosecutorial honor and an element of corruption, and (d) that the LA D.A. pushed for his arrest in order to focus attention to his office and to address the long-slumbering issues brought to the fore by Marina Zenovich's documentary -- i.e., it's partly an attention-getting p.r. move and partly a way of responding to the doc."

But to rebut:

A) Nonsense. He's done just fine career-wise and I can't imagine he's had to rattle a tin cup for work. He won an Oscar, deservedly, while a fugitive.

B) True--but which matters more, the victim or the crime? It's a mitigating circumstance, one that would be edifying to see played out.

C and D are elements of the case that can be brought up in a court of law. It's shabby, it's sordid, it'll take months if not years to sort out. But the time has come to reckon with it.

Popdose: Homicide on DVD

David Mamet's third film, long absent on home video, bows on DVD via the Criterion Collection.

Enjoy a banned book this week

What do To Kill a Mockingbird, Go Ask Alice, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn have in common? They've all been banned, or challenged--and not in the prehistory of the 20th century, but in the last two years. So do your bit against the ignorant and benighted and participate in Banned Books Week. It's as easy as going to your bookshelf and having a "forbidden" experience between the covers, as I did once with the notorious Judy Blume.

RIP William Safire

He "corresponded" with me once. But he didn't have to do that much, so farewell to the longtime columnist.

Popdose: The Essential, Annoying New York Film Festival

It's back, for better or for worse. A view from the cheap seats, which I've had for 15 years now. Pictured is Penelope Cruz in one of her guises from Pedro Almodovar's Broken Embraces, which closes the festival on Oct. 11.

Intolerance

I took Larissa on our daily stroll today. I didn't realize that the goons from the Westboro Baptist Church were in town, protesting near Brooklyn Tech, at a local intersection already choked with construction. There were five of them (including earnest-looking teens), about two dozen cops who weren't about to let things get out of hand, and at the time we were there about 100 protesters, mostly students (that figure is said to have swelled to 200-400). It was a pretty jovial demonstration, actually--the church is so extreme it's (almost) difficult to take seriously, as repellent as its signs and literature are. But I was glad to see the neighborhood come together to shout down the voices of bigotry, which manifest themselves more subtly elsewhere and always need to be denounced.

Here's Westboro's picket schedule, which takes them to several Brooklyn synagogues this weekend. Show up and shout them down. God hates fanatics.

I stood up for my own principles today. As I was taking the baby upstairs I noticed someone fumbling with the intercom system in our building. I went back down to see if I could assist. It turned out to be a campaign worker (also earnest-looking, the calm, unruffled face of belief) for David Yassky, who's in an election runoff for comptroller. I took the pamphlet he was offering, the one he wanted to slip under everyone's doors. Thanks, he said--and could he come upstairs to deliver the rest? "No, you cannot!" I barked--I detest Yassky, one of the term-limits turncoats perpetuating the Bloomberg years. It's bad enough that I have a Bloomberg campaign office around the block without having a rep from one of his spineless would-be lackeys accost me in my home. I'm sure another of Yassky's drones will be back before next Tuesday. But in the meantime, and this goes double for the Westboro bunch: Go sell crazy someplace else.

Witchcraft through the ages

I try to maintain a positive and optimistic attitude toward my fellow man, but every so often I read something that brings me up short. As the Wicked Witch of the West said, "What a world, what a world." (Photo from the Scandinavian silent film Haxan, 1922.)

Popdose: That Hamilton Woman on DVD

If it was good enough for Winston Churchill and Andrew Sarris, maybe Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh's finest screen pairing, now on DVD from Criterion, will be good enough for you.

Emmys, blah

I've always been indifferent to the Emmys, which interrupt the new TV season just as it's getting started with reruns from the year past. Instead of tuning in, I watched the new-edition Bob Hope, Neil Patrick Harris, in the winning Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog on DVD. Yawn: 30 Rock, a smug show whose appeal I'll never understand, won again, as did Mad Men, Bryan Cranston, Glenn Close, Alec Baldwin--good Christ, what a bore! I think prior winners should be obliged to stand down from time to time, or voters should be forced to broaden their lazy, inbred viewing habits. But congratulations to Cherry Jones (pictured) for her win for 24--luckily for the lengthening-in-the-tooth show, one I stick with year after year like one of those lazy, inbred Emmy voters, she's back again this season as the leader of the free world (and front runner for a second, too-lazy-and-inbred-to-consider-someone-else trophy).

Popdose: Stars Fall, But Streep Soars

Amidst the collapse of the American movie star, 60-year-old Meryl Streep is bigger than ever. An appreciation, beginning with her latest hit, Julie and Julia.

RIP, etc.

Paul Burke, Mary Travers, Henry Gibson, Zakes Mokae, JIm Carroll, Larry Gelbart, even the woman who inspired Norma Rae--a whole generation that came of age in the 60s and 70s is departing, faster than we would like. It's enough for me to start a sub-blog called "RIP" but that's too depressing. It's enough right now to simply acknowledge their passing with this short goodbye (can you find Gibson in this terrific poster? I love it; a built-in Mad magazine parody).

More from my crib

As Jay-Z's single moves up the charts his reference to our address has gone viral. If he drops dead I can only imagine the candlelight vigils. In the meantime I'm conducting tours.

RIP: Tough times for Texans

No sooner had King of the Hill expired on Fox than Patrick Swayze lost his battle with pancreatic cancer. I stood by the sitcom for its entire 13-season run, through the thick of some choice episodes where its gently satiric tone was at perfect pitch to the thin of weeks where it was preempted by football (apparently its 10th, and nearly final, season was made up largely of shows that went unaired during its ninth). Mike Judge's other TV shows and movies get more ink but I think Hank Hill and the gang, whose travails held a mirror up to the red/blue state "divide," will endure as his finest work. Though animated, it was the best real-life family sitcom on air. Then again I couldn't not love a show with a character named "Bobby," a name drawlingly syllabilized the way Judge delivered it, with affectionate exasperation. Rumor has it that it may resurface on ABC but like Scrubs it came to a fittingly bittersweet end for me.

As for Swayze: Well, the 80s icon had trouble extending his career past 1990 and his biggest hit, Ghost--his extended cameo in the long-delayed Dirty Dancing sequel is something of an embarrassment. I liked him (maybe for the wrong reasons) in the down-and-dirty camp classic Road House (1989), his out-Zenning of Keanu Reeves in Point Break (pictured) is inspired, and he earned enough of a cult reputation to be a part of the cult sensation Donnie Darko (2001). His final campaign was as valiant as fellow Lone Star statesperson Farrah Fawcett's.

Corman conquers the Oscars

The venerable producer Roger Corman is receiving an honorary Oscar this year, less, perhaps, for his inspired, budget-maximizing direction of Attack of the Crab Monsters, Poe adaptations, and biker flicks than his nurturing of the talent that made the 70s such a watershed decade for Hollywood filmmaking. The good news is that he and a gratifyingly full slate of recipients--Lauren Bacall, John Calley, and Gordon Willis also made the cut--will get a dinner devoted exclusively to them. The bad is that they'll get scant attention on the actual telecast, due to a rules change designed to trim the running time. That's too bad; who wouldn't want to see Corman surrounded by the likes of Coppola, Scorsese, etc., and clips from pictures that never baited Oscar? But It, who conquered the world in 1956 with Beverly Garland by its side, is pleased.

Double header

Breaking radio silence to lighten the load on a more-dreary-than-usual anniversary, two from Popdose: A review of Criterion Eclipse's set of hard-edged Japanese crime melodramas, "Nikkatsu Noir," and an overview of movies featuring John, Paul, George and Ringo after they were fab, tied of course to this week's CD re-release.

Popdose: Summer Hits and Misses

What was In the Loop (pictured)...and what was out of it? Find out as I wrap up the season. (The finger-jabbing Peter Capaldi, all these years after Local Hero, was equally outstanding in this summer's gripping Torchwood: Children of Earth, surely the genre TV event of the year.)

Hip-hop paradise

A neighbor reported that former renter Jay-Z has immortalized our building in song on his new album. You can hear the address about 30 seconds in. The owner reports that he's unsurprised that Jay-Z, who lived here in 1992, used it as his "stash spot." So, too, did actor-musician Lord Jamar, who lived in our very unit when not reporting for duty on the HBO show Oz. Jazz trumpeter extraordinaire Terence Blanchard also lived here for a time. Rosie Perez almost moved in--but was irked when a would-be neighbor asked for her autograph and backed out of the deal. Come back and visit, Jay-Z, and bring the Mrs.--I think you have the money now to afford to buy your own crib.

TCM in HD

Woo-hoo...almighty Time Warner Cable, which taketh away HDNet Movies a few months ago in a corporate snit, hath giveth Turner Classic Movies in hi-def, on channel 782 here in New York (that's exactly 700 up from its standard-def berth, so easy to remember). Terrific. Now if only I could get the HD set downstairs to watch it...

Popdose: Jeanne Dielman on DVD

A bedraggled Delphine Seyrig (no Last Year at Marienbad glamor here) goes from numbing household task to numbing household task in Chantal Akerman's 1975 classic, new on disc from Criterion. Girlfriend, I can so relate.

Mobile movies

We've gone from worrying about watching Lawrence of Arabia on cellphones and what that might portend for the death of cinema to this. But the question remains: Does anyone want to see Jude Law in a movie, even a mini-movie on your phone?

"Babelgum, the independent Web and mobile content platform, announced today it will release Sally Potter’s new film Rage with an episodic premiere via its free mobile application for iPhone and iPod devices from Monday, Sept. 21. This is the first time a feature-length film will premiere on mobile phones. The mobile premiere will kick off a multi-platform, multi-territory release that includes the US DVD release on Sept. 22 through Liberation Entertainment; an interactive satellite premiere in the UK on Sept. 24; the online release via Babelgum beginning Sept. 28; and the Adventure Pictures DVD release in the UK and Ireland, also on Sept. 28. The red carpet event and Q&A following the September 24th premiere at London’s BFI/Southbank will be broadcast online commercial-free via live streaming site Justin.tv.

The film will be shown in seven episodes through Babelgum’s mobile application, adding one new episode per day, for a full week. This unique strategy fits perfectly with Potter’s vision for her film, as Rage tells the behind-the scenes story of a New York fashion show through a dynamic series of intimate interviews, as if shot by a schoolboy on his mobile phone over a seven day period. The film, which features Simon Abkarian, Steve Buscemi, Lily Cole, Judi Dench, Eddie Izzard, Jude Law, John Leguizamo and Dianne Wiest, premiered at the 2009 Berlin Film Festival. Written and directed by Sally Potter, Rage was produced by Christopher Sheppard and Andrew Fierberg.

Babelgum and Liberation Entertainment are working closely with Sally Potter and the filmmakers on the pre-release campaign, which rolled out with custom online and mobile selections featuring the theatrical trailer and selected clips beginning July 24. A Rage mobile channel will premiere on Sept. 21. Beginning Sept. 21 one new episode will premiere per day and build towards all seven being viewable on mobile devices by Sunday, Sept. 27. The online premiere of the seven segments will commence on Monday, Sept. 28 with two episodes released per week. On Sept. 24, London’s BFI/Southbank will host the first interactive, multi-venue film premiere for Rage, tying in 35 theaters across the UK and Ireland for an up close look at the red carpet arrivals, film and an interactive Q&A to follow with Sally Potter and cast members. Audience members around the world will be able to participate in the Q&A through SMS and Skype.

In a statement from director Sally Potter and producers Christopher Sheppard and Andrew Fierberg, the filmmakers said: “We always wanted to incorporate new media platforms into our release strategy and to find a novel approach to bringing Rage to both new and traditional film audiences. We are delighted to be working with Babelgum, who we see as a true partner in crafting an innovative distribution model.”

Oh, and that's Law in the photo, as a tranny supermodel. Hmm, maybe I'll have to dial up an episode.

Popdose: The Last Days of Disco on DVD

Whit Stillman's barbed lament to the passing of the disco era (and his last film to date, 11 years ago) gets the deluxe Criterion treatment. Does it bring me to my feet?