The Dark Tower Review: Blockbuster Take on Stephen Kings Epic Is Major Misfire

So much is so wrong about The Dark Tower, the stunted film version of Stephen Kings marvelously dense and dazzling series of eight novels, that its hard to know where to kick off a critical reckoning. The crux of the problem is that the bestselling authors magnum opus deserves an open-ended miniseries treatment, akin to what HBO has done with Game of Thrones or Peter Jacksons treatment of the magnificent cinematic trilogy Lord of the Rings.

Instead, we get a 95-minute movie that plays like a mash-up of Kings mythic themes with no connective tissue. Its as if director Nikolaj Arcel and co-screenwriters Akiva Goldsman, Jeff Pinker and Anders Thomas Jensen pulled an all-nighter skimming The Gunslinger novels and shoved whatever they could remember onto the big screen. Call it The Dark Tower for Dummies.

For those who know nothing about the plot, it involves Roland Deschain (Idris Elba), an allegorical Gunslinger trying to save Mid-World from the Man in Black (Matthew McConaughey), a sorcerer saddled with the name Walter. Old Walt is tasked with destroying the dark tower, which is the only thing stopping monsters from taking over the planet. Is this a metaphor for the Trump administration? Dont get your hopes up.

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The story is told through the eyes of Jake Chambers (Tom Taylor), a lonely child living in New York with his widowed mom and her dickwad of a boyfriend. Like the kid in The Shining, Jake has the shine specifically, an ability to see into other worlds. Jake draws what he sees, involving the Gunslinger and the Man in Black, which makes everyone think hes crazy. Not the Man the Black, who wants to harness the kids power for evil. Dont you hate it when that happens?

So Jake enters a time portal, zaps into Mid-World and agrees to help the Gunslinger serve up a cold dish of revenge. Battles ensue, along with actors in melting face masks and some really crappy CGI, resulting in everyone mixing it up back in the Big Apple. Also, the Man in Black seems unkillable, except from a bullet from Rolands gun, which is forged from King Arthurs sword Excalibur.

Confused? You aint heard nothing yet. Arcel wastes the two protean stars at his disposal. Elba does stoic, then more stoic, except for a cool hot dog joke near the end. And McConaughey, perhaps sensing that hes climbed aboard a sinking ship (reports of a troubled post-production are legion) does his over-caffeinated damnedest to juice things up. Not happening. Though I did like it when Walter strolled around whispering commands to unsuspecting victims. Hate, he directs a little girl on a park bench. Stop breathing, he tells a dude who annoys him. To audiences, hoping the Man in Black will stroll into their multiplex and oblige the management to End the Torture, Im down with you on that. This unholy mess shouldnt happen to a King, much less a paying customer.

Deepwater Horizon, Sully and the Rise of Neo-Patriotic Blockbusters

The new cowboy doesnt arrive on horseback, and if he wears a hat, its probably part of an official uniform. He might tote a gun, but he doesnt always need one to defend himself. Hes no superhero just a guy with an unshakable dedication to his job. He is many men, but this week, hes Mark Wahlberg and hes here to save the Gulf of Mexico.

A particular strain of highly patriotic blockbusters (or at least movies affecting the outward appearance of patriotism, depending on which side of the aisle you poll) has cropped up in recent years, and these Americana-courting pictures from Clint Eastwoods political flashpoint American Sniper to Peter Bergs bravery-porn spectacle Deepwater Horizon have vaulted the everyday guy into an especially accessible brand of champion. Our most beloved heroes wear blue collars instead of capes, and carry lunch pails instead of magical weaponry. Whether you agree that these movies reflect the U.S. of A.s opinion of itself with full clarity or not, one thing is certain: our cinematic saviors have moved out of the stratosphere and into the house next door.

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The latest example of this trend, the true-story disaster movie Deepwater Horizon, casts Mark Wahlberg as Mike Williams, one of the noblest workers aboard the British Petroleum oil rig that exploded in 2010, endangering lives and poisoning the Gulf coastline for months to follow. Hes a clean-cut man of the people who loves his wife and daughter the sort of typical working-class hero that this emergent type of patriotism favors. He seems perfectly average, until the inevitable crisis (plane crash, rig explosion, insurgent attack) requires that he springs into action and transforms into the pillar of courage that has captured the American imagination again and again.

A natural-born leader, Williams shows great courageness and grace under pressure as he scrambles to evacuate the malfunctioning drilling vessel. He handles the situation the way we all like to think we would, a kind of wish-fulfillment fantasy with which Wahlberg is all too familiar. This is a dude whos decisive yet accessible, willing to make the difficult choices for the good of everyone else the idealized conservatives President mixed with Jack Bauer and your weekend drinking buddy. Like Chris Kyles traumatizing sniper assignments, or Chesley Sullenbergers emergency crash-landing into the Hudson in Eastwoods more recent Sully, heroism is a dirty job but someones gotta do it. And these movies tacitly suggest that society would buckle if such bold and frequently complicated guys were not around to guard it.

But how this wave of films treat their heroes also provides a crucial insight into their fundamental American-ness. While terrorists gifted Lone Survivor with its ready-made villains (does it really get much more American than that?), the more commonplace bad guys in these red-white-and-blue blockbusters is The System. For Deepwater Horizon, its the craven BP suits who cut corners at the expense of workers just to save a buck, personified in John Malkovichs amusingly James Carville-ian executive. For this past Januarys 13 Hours (a.k.a. Michael Bays Benghazi movie), its the lily-livered government contractors who come off looking like pond scum while our valiant soldiers fought for freedom, liberty, etc. For Sully, its the National Transportation Safety Board, a department of bloodless pencil-pushers Eastwood paints as incapable of understanding what Sullbenberger went through. (They dare to question his methods!) Larger networks of authority can never be trusted, these movies tell us; theyre always looking out for their own interests and leaving the little guy to fend for himself. And if theres any lesson to be learned from the unendingVeep episodethat is this election, its that pervasive distrust for the Establishment always plays well with the masses.

In a moviegoing era where selling concepts unaffiliated with a pre-existing brand becomes a steeper uphill battle every summer, these populist pictures have routinely cleaned up at the ticket counter. While Deepwater Horizons opening weekend wasnt quite what its makers were hoping pulling in $20.2 million and coming in second behind Tim Burtons YA-novel adaptation Miss Peregrines Home for Peculiar Children Eastwoods huge paydays for Sully ($105 million) and American Sniper ($350 million) illustrate the earning power of these films with paying audiences. Chris Kyles biopic was another lightly-buzzy Oscar contender until political types claimed it as a partisan expression of the American way; that didnt stop millions of viewers, invigorated by red-blooded patriotic duty, from heeding the call. Even Bergs previous collaboration with Wahlberg, the 2013 military drama Lone Survivor, netted $154 million domestically, making it the second-highest-earning January release ever, trailing only Cloverfield. (Truly, nothing unites us as a nation quite like giant alien attacks.)

Because such neo-patriotic pictures extol a red-state-friendly set of values self-determination, the wielding of great power, courage under fire they tend to click with more conservatively-aligned folks. Some liberal audiences bristled at the ambiguity of American Sniper and Lone Survivor, concerned that the gravity of war may be lost while watching in awe at the men who make it happen.But polarized reception or no, theres no denying that these films have tapped into something powerful, and vitally of the moment. In times of great uncertainty such as these, its cathartic to believe that there are still people willing to cut through the bureaucracy and sacrifice themselves to keep us safe, and yes, even to keep America great.

Movies like Deepwater Horizon sell an idea that builds on the American Dream of self-sufficiency and bootstrap-pulling: Once weve clawed our way into realizing that dream, there will be guardians to defend it. In the face of external foes and internal red tape, the men of American Sniper and Lone Survivor fought for truth, justice, picket fences, apple pie, baseball the whole Rockwellian shebang.Sully and Deepwater Horizon go one step further andbring that military heroism into the everyday workforce, adding a more relatable dimension to an already resonant vein of storytelling. Mike Williams is the hero America desperately wants right now, but more crucially, hes the hero we all could be. We may not be like Tom Cruises constantly moving men of action, Harrison Fords gruff swashbucklers or any actor whos played James Bonds. We are all potential Mark Wahlbergs.

Thumbsucker

Justin Cobb (Lou Pucci) is seventeen and still sucking his thumb. Its hell on his school and sex life. His guru orthodontist (Keanu Reeves in a hilarious cameo) clouds the issue with hippie psychobabble. But when Justin is medicated for his attention-deficit disorder, the numbnut becomes a narcissist who leads the debating team to victory. The change shocks his coach (a terrific Vince Vaughn) and his parents (Tilda Swinton and Vincent DOnofrio), who turn out to be just as screwed up as Justin. Debuting writer-director Mike Mills remember the name brings heart and sting to Walter Kirns novel. Pucci is an actor to watch: He rides this spellbinder without softening the truths that plague the thumbsucker in all of us.

Leviathan

Why should you suffer through a 140-minute Russian film that is basically a contemporary remake of The Book of Job? Because its a stupendous piece of work, thats why, and because it represents the kind of challenging, intimate filmmaking that transcends language and borders. Director AndreyZvyagintsev (The Return, Elena) puts contemporary Russia, as up-to-the-minute as Putin and Pussy Riot, under the microscope in Leviathan. Dont be misled by the films small town setting, a fishing community in northern Russia; Zvyagintsev is using the problems of a single family to expose the bruised soul of a nation.

This is the story of one man, Kolya (Aleksey Serebryakov, striking chords that go deep and true), whose family has lived for generations by the Barents Sea in a village where the skeletal remains of whales and ships litter the landscape. Kolya lives there now with his son Roma (Sergey Pokhodaev) and his second wife Lilya (the seductive, mysterious Elena Lyadova). He runs an auto-repair shop without much incident until the compromised state and the orthodox church descend on him like plagues. The larcenous mayor, Vadim (a superb Roman Maydanov), uses civil and church law to take Kolyas land by right of eminent domain. Luckily, Kolya has a lawyer acquaintance, Dmitri (Vladimir Vdovitchenkov), who travels from Moscow to show these local sharks whats what, even if takes blackmail and a face-off with the Mob.

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Without spoiling a film in which adultery, betrayal and a maybe murder all figure in the telling, be assured you wont want to miss a thing. That demands careful attention to Zvyagintsevs densely packed widescreen frames. Leviathan is sometimes too ambiguous for its own good, but between bouts of fighting, illicit sex and prodigious vodka swilling, the film looks with humor and heartbreak on a working class thats not getting satisfying answers from God or the courts. The performances are ferociously fine, the camerawork from Mikhail Krichman makes poetry of light and its absence, the music from Philip Glasss 1983 opera Akhnaten galvanizes, and Zvyagintsev gives biblical scope to a tale that draws meaning from the smallest details. Leviathan brushes harsh reality with cinematic grandeur and marks Zvyagintsev as a world-class talent.

Watch Lady Gaga, Glenn Close Tie for Best Actress at Critics Choice Awards

The Oscar race for Best Actress is now even more heated. Lady Gaga and Glenn Close tied for Best Actress at the 24th annual Critics Choice Awards in Los Angeles on Sunday, giving both an extra edge for the upcoming Academy Award nominations.

Close,who earned a statue for The Wife,was called onstage first by presenter Willem Dafoe, who announced the award would be a tie. Gaga, who won for her work in A Star Is Born, broke down in tears as she took the stage to accept the award Closes speech. Im so very happy that you won this this evening, Gaga told Close as the pair embraced. This is a tremendous honor.

Lady Gaga tears up after tying for best actress with Glenn Close #CriticsChoice https://t.co/slZIvVY9SM pic.twitter.com/vsAA75S39D

Variety (@Variety) January 14, 2019

Close recently earned the Golden Globe for her performance and thanked her fellow nominees during the Critics Choice Awards, who includedOlivia Colman and Melissa McCarthy.I was thinking that, you know, the world kind of pits us against each other in this profession and I know that from all the women in this category, and I think I can speak for all the women in this room, we celebrate each other, the actress told the audience.We are proud to be in this room together.

Lady Gaga also won Best Song forShallow and took time during her speech to thank her director and co-star Bradley Cooper.Bradley, you are a magical filmmaker, the singer said.And you are just as magical of a human being. She added,Ive never had an experience with a director or an actor like I had with you and I will cherish it forever.You seamlessly were both the love of my life and the man behind the camera. Gagas speech ran long as music began to play her offstage. Dont worry I can still do this with a piano background, she quipped.

The duo were the second tie of the evening, following Amy Adams and Patricia Arquette, who shared the honor of Best Actress in a Limited Series for Sharp Objects andEscape at Dannemora respectively.

Captain America: The First Avenger Great hero, mediocre action

Peter Travers is full of faint praise for Captain America: The First Avenger, a super hero movie that isnt at all the disaster he was expecting. Though Chris Evans gives the title character a surprising depth, the film stumbles in its second half, where the plot gets a bit boring and the action is merely standard issue. Despite its flaws, its a reasonably good time at the movies, though you should avoid seeing it in 3D, as those effects were added afterward and look terrible.

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Iron Man 2

It must be a jumbo-ass pain cooking up a sequel to a movie everyone effing loved the first time. Iron Man wasnt just a big, ballsy, $318 million box-office jackpot in 2008. It reinvented Robert Downey Jr. as an action hero and a genuine movie star. Iron Man 2 total blast that it is doesnt jazz us with the thrill of discovery. But we do have Downey, still exuding his irresistible loose-cannon vibe in a Hollywood product thatll whup every summer 2010 epic that dares to take it on. Downey is actually better and bug-fuckier than ever, even when the movie buries him in unnecessary clutter. Too many stunts, too many subplots, too many villains jammed in from the Marvel Comics universe, too many romping, stomping, clanking iron armies.

Screw it. Iron Man 2 knows how to jump the hurdles and have you smacking your lips for more. For that, all credit to Downey. As Tony Stark, the playboy weapons-manufacturer-turned-pacifist-superhero, Downey never tries to be likable, like Tobey Maguire as Spider-Man, or to throw a pity party for himself, like all the actors who climb into the Batman suit. Downey plays Stark like the horny, hard-drinking, self-destructive narcissist he is. Stark likes his life on the edge. He knows the shrapnel-wounded heart that fuels him is also killing him little by little. And he gets off on it.

The secret of the Iron Man film franchise is that Stark is always more compelling outside the suit than he is in it. Cover him up, and all you have is heavy metal. Downey knows this intuitively. Lucky for Iron Man 2, returning director Jon Favreau (Swingers, Elf) has the same up-for-anything spirit as his star. Whenever the plot threatens to go conventional and sugary, these bad boys turn on the sass. Theyre twisted siblings under the skin.

As for the plot machinery, its just that. Hear it grind. Iron Man 2 catches up with Stark in midcrisis. The U.S. wants to turn his Iron Man armor into a weapon. So do Russia, Iran and North Korea. Tony wont let his invention fall into the wrong hands despite attacks from Senator Stern (Garry Shandling doing sleaze to perfection) and Bill OReilly (the real one), who question his patriotism. Tony says no one is close to catching up with him.

Ha! Enter Ivan Vanko, a.k.a. Whiplash, a Russian killing machine played by Mickey Rourke like his Wrestler character after a massive case of tattoo poisoning. Rourke is a bloody wonder, spitting out his lines in an outrageous Russian accent to rival John Malkovich in Rounders. To hear Vanko pine for his parrot (Vere eees my boird?) is comic bliss. Rourke, too good an actor to slide by on silliness, invests Vanko with human dimensions. Hardened by his time in prison, he blames Stark for the death of his father and for stealing his invention.

In the movies killer stunt sequence, Vanko decked out as Whiplash with two springloaded electromagnetic whips extending from his arms confronts Stark at the Monaco Grand Prix. Stark is handed a briefcase by his Girl Friday, Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow, pretty but wasted), and it morphs into Iron Man armor. Very cool. But Whiplash is a formidable opponent. I wont spoil what happens, but prepare to be knocked for a loop.

Rourke is more than enough of an adversary for one movie. He and Downey, playing fatherless boys who cant grow up, are a dynamite team. But Iron Man 2 isnt content with one bad guy. Theres also Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell), the industrialist who wants to steal Starks thunder by putting Vanko on his payroll. Rockwell is a hoot, glorying in being slimy and soulless, like Stark before his conversion.

So far, so serviceable. Then its overload. A sleek Scarlett Johansson shows up as Natalie Rushman, a.k.a. Black Widow, working for Stark Industries but really engaged in espionage in the employ of S.H.I.E.L.D., under the direction of Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson). Who can Stark trust? His military friend Lt. Col. James Rhodey Rhodes (Terrence Howard in the first Iron Man, now replaced by Don Cheadle) is constructing his own War Machine, a robot outfitted with every weapon in the armys arsenal. Whiplash, in league with Hammer, goes War Machine one better by building an entire droid army. Before you know it, the clank, clank, clank has robbed the film of intimacy in the name of spectacle, with AC/DC on the soundtrack shooting to thrill.

For some, it will be a fair trade-off. It took four writers to construct the first Iron Man. Responsibility for the sequel fell to just one man, Justin Theroux, who co-wrote Tropic Thunder, the comedy that earned Downey (in blackface) an Oscar nomination. Theroux clearly knows Downeys verbal rhythms. He also knows that Stark is a man hurting inside. That pain gives us a rooting interest. Favreau supplies the go-go-go that makes the movie stratospherically entertaining, even without 3-D. But its the promiscuously talented Downey who adds the grace notes that make Iron Man 2 something to remember.

Oscars Ratings Dip to Lowest Mark in Eight Years

Chris Rocks much anticipated, take-no-prisoners opening monologue, a Lady Gaga performanceand the near-certainty of Leonardo DiCaprios first Oscar win werent enough to boost the Academy Awards television ratings as the ceremony witnessed its lowest viewership in eight years. With only 34.3 million viewers, the 88th annual Academy Awards were the third-least-watched event in Oscars history, Deadline reports.

While there is no clear-cut factor behind the dip in viewership, Variety reports that the lack of blockbusters in the Best Picture category only three of the eight nominated films (Mad Max: Fury Road, The Revenant and The Martian) cleared $100 million at the box office was likely the main culprit.

As Deadline notes, the second-most-watched Oscar ceremony since 2000 was in 2004 when Lord of the Rings: Return of the King the final film in that box office-ruling trilogy won Best Picture. The biggest films of 2015 Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Jurassic World, etc. were all shut out of the major Oscars categories.

However, despite the low ratings, Variety reports that the #OscarsSoWhite controversyand its ensuing boycottbarely impacted its television audience, although the Reverend Al Sharpton credited the outrage over the lack of diversity among major categorynominees for alienating viewers.

The early reports of a decline in the Oscar viewership is heartening to those of us that campaigned around asking citizens to tune out, Sharpton said in a statement Monday. This is a significant decline and should send a message to the Academy and to movie studio heads. Though clearly we dont take full credit for the decline, certainly one would have to assume we were effective and part of the decline. And to those that mocked the idea of a tune out, it seems the joke was on them.

Star Wars Franchise Planning Never-Ending String of Films

There are at least four new Star Warsfilms currently on the horizon beginning with the December 18th arrival of Episode VII: The Force Awakens and according to a new article, thats only the beginning of the cinematic universe Disney plans on creating out of George Lucas brainchild. Wired writes that like Marvel and the DC Comics billion-dollar movie franchises Disney and Lucasfilm hope to eventually deliver a new Star Wars film to audiences on an annual basis, with no end in sight.

Thats where the title of the article You Wont Live to See the Final Star Wars Movie kicks in: Disneys plans for the franchise are so expansive including, potentially, a new film every year as long as the box office demand is still there that those who actually witnessed Star Wars in movie theaters in 1977 will likely shuffle off their mortal coil before the saga ultimately scrolls its last end credits.

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Star Wars is its own genre, Lawrence Kasdan, who wrote Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi and assisted on The Force Awakens, told Wired. Like all genres, it can hold a million different kinds of artists and stories. They say Buddha is what you do to it. And thats Star Wars. It can be anything you want it to be.

And unlike its Marvel counterpart which can only carry on for as long as franchise centerpiece Robert Downey Jr. agrees to portray Iron Man before a reboot is required the possibilities are endless for Star Wars. The saga literally has an entire universe to draw stories from, and theyre not tethered to any time frame;the December 2016 anthology film Rogue Onetakes place right before the events that were the catalyst of the original 1977 film.

In the case of Rogue One, were essentially making a period piece, Lucasfilm Story Groups Kiri Hart told Wired. The benefit of making additional episodes that move forward on the timeline is that we are making new space for ourselves.

In addition to the new trilogy and Rogue One, Disney and Lucasfilms are reportedly also working on prequel films dedicated to a pair of the original trilogys most beloved characters, Han Solo and Boba Fett.

Bret Easton Ellis: The Canyons Is a Cold, Dead Movie

After tons of rumors and hype over the past year, The Canyons will finally be released in select theaters and through video on demand this Friday. The Kickstarter-financed film co-stars troubled actress Lindsay Lohan (in her first leading role in six years), and adult film veteran James Deen (in his first mainstream role). Its an exploration of deceit and manipulation among wealthy and not-so-wealthy young people in Los Angeles, with some violence and graphic nudity thrown in. When youre going out to dinner with people and they ask you, God, is that movie you made really as bad as everyone thinks its going to be? that can be a little annoying, says Ellis, laughing over the phone from his Los Angeles office. But you just gotta see the movie, and youll see for yourself.

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What do you think of The Canyons as a finished product?
Its pretty good. And I think the fact that it even got made was kind of amazing. The mission to make this movie was almost as important as the movie itself. From the time that I wrote the first page of the script to when we had a cut of the movie was about seven months. And the fact that it looks much better than the quarter-million that it cost to make. It just felt like the whole process has been, despite what youve read, very positive. Everything that was talked about happened over a period of maybe five bad days of a schedule of 22 or 23. That New York Times Magazine piece made it seem like the entire movie was a train wreck, but in actuality, we came in on schedule and on budget. But thats not the perception thats out there. So, whats the better story? I read it, too. I was very disappointed in the piece. But, at the same time, Paul was really happy about it. He liked having it for the publicity. I mean, he thought it was great for the movie, and so I kind of changed my mind when I saw that Paul was completely fine with the piece. But it distorts the making of the movie.

Was Paul your first choice to direct?
Well, it wasnt a choice, really. What happened was we were working on another movie together, and it was, I think, a month away from being shot. It was cast and we had all the sets and locations, and the money fell through. Paul and I were just really bummed out, so he said, Write an original script and Ill direct it, and well make it in two months. Well put our money into it and lets just do it. I just want to make a movie. And thats how it happened.

The film was rejected by both Sundance and SXSW. Did that bother you?
I didnt care. I didnt think that we needed Sundance or SXSW. I thought there was a risk that we wouldnt get a distributor if we went to one of those festivals. I mean, the spirit of making The Canyons is a very Sundance thing, but the movie itself does not conform to the content of most Sundance movies, which have their whole host of indie clichs. Theyre about the resilience of the human spirit or whatever. The Canyons is a cold, dead movie, I guess, about cold, dead people. I like that about it I think something about that coldness makes it fascinating. But that coldness doesnt really play well at Sundance or SXSW. So my argument was: were going to get a distributor for this movie, and we might lose our chance if we go to either one of those festivals.

Whats your least favorite part of the movie-making process?
My least favorite part is that you have people putting in their two cents. Its their job to do that, but it doesnt make movies better. It just flattens them out and waters them down. But that seems to be retreating now. Its going to go away because people have access to equipment to cameras and to lenses and to making movies very cheaply.

There have been rumors that Lindsay Lohan had issues with Schrader and James Deen. Did you have any problems with her?
I was against her being cast at first because I heard she wasnt well and I thought she was going to bring a lot of baggage to the movie. But everything went away when we saw that she was playing the role this way. It really worked for the movie. She made the character much more combative and confrontational, whereas, in the script, the girl might have been less likely to act that way. She gave it a desperation that I really liked a lot.

Is it true French actress Leslie Coutterand was an understudy, just in case Lohan was fired or left?
Yes. That was in the first week. When it became apparent that Lindsay was going to finish the movie, I think Leslie was told, No, its okay. Lindsay was fired for being Late to the first rehearsal, and that was a very dramatic day. The New York Times got that totally right. It actually was much worse than how it was reported it was much more emotional and draining. I know that Leslie was definitely in the wings that first week.

Who has a brighter mainstream future on screen: James Deen or Lindsay Lohan?
Thats a good question. James doesnt want a mainstream career that badly. If it happens, great. But we approached James. He wasnt going out there before The Canyons trying to go on auditions. He was making a pretty good living in something that he liked to do, and he wasnt desperate for this role. He was always super casual about it. If he got it, great, if not, he still worked. He worked on porn during the shooting of The Canyons, so just because of that fact, Id have to say Lindsay. I mean, I think if Lindsay stays clean and sober, she would be great. I dont think she has to be totally sober, but if she pulled it back a bit? [Laughs.] The thing that people forget is that shes actually a good screen actress. A very good screen actress. Its just been buried by the tabloid activity of the last four or five years, however long its been going on. And so she obviously has a more viable future. But, you know, it depends on how she decides to approach her life.

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In your latest novel Imperial Bedrooms, a character mentions that they made a movie about Less Than Zero, Bedrooms prequel of sorts. Do you think characters in your future novels will mention The Canyons?
That could happen. I just really dont know if there is a future novel right now, thats the only thing. I mean, there are notes for one, but Im not sure. The Less Than Zero/Imperial Bedrooms scene was a very weird case. For some reason, I was going through this process where writing that down meant a lot to me. I was going through something really dark, and I wanted to revisit where Clay was at that point in his life, so I wanted to open the book that way. I dont know if I would repeat that again, where I would have a character commenting on the real Bret Easton Ellis life.

So youre not writing a new novel?
Well, I have a lot of notes, and Im moving them around, and Im moving them around some more. Sometimes it speaks to me, and sometimes it doesnt. So I dont know whats going to happen. You really cant force it. You have to stick to it in a very pronounced way. It has to really say, Okay, Im ready to be written. You have to write me now. And, I dont know, there are places where I dont think Im there yet.

Which of your books was adapted into the best movie?
I think by far it was The Rules of Attraction. For some reason, Roger Avary was able to find the visual equivalent of the book. I dont think Less Than Zero or American Psycho really did that. Maybe The Informers did a bit. Less Than Zero was very big budget, very over-lit. I mean, it looks gorgeous, but I dont know if that captured the visual equivalent of the novel. Its the same with American Psycho. Maybe American Psycho needed to be a bit more expensive to pull that off. But Roger was able to find the cinematic equivalent for a very difficult book to adapt. Since so many people were telling their own version of the same story, how do you pull that off in a movie? I think that movies brilliant. I mean, I really do. I wasnt expecting much when I went to see it, but I really like it. Whenever it pops up on cable or something, I can still watch it and be happy with it.

Youve described yourself as a very fearful person. What worries you the most?
Answering that question. Im very worried about answering that question. You know, its just a general outlook, thats what it is a macro way of dealing with the world or reacting to the world. And I actually think that a lot of writers have this kind of relationship with the world, and thats why they can create drama, because they can find it in anything. Its a great way to work and to be inspired, but its also a very difficult way to live. And thats why a lot of writers turn to drugs and alcohol as a release from the act of creating drama all day.

Youve had a lot of controversial tweets over the years last December you tweeted, come over at do bring coke now after watching the Rolling Stones documentary Crossfire Hurricane. Was it that bad? And did you score the coke?
I actually wanted to do T-shirts with that on it. People still bring it up. What was happening was that, after the Rolling Stones documentary, I did want some coke. But, quite honestly, I dont do coke. My coke days are over. But, for some reason, that night I wanted to do coke. And so I texted my friend who was out, and they werent going to be around. I texted my boyfriend, but he was out with friends. And then I thought I was texting someone I knew who could get it, and I wasnt texting I actually tweeted it instead. The next day, I actually laughed. I mean I was a bit mortified, but I actually thought it was funny. And I never deleted it.

Thats hilarious.
I never got the coke. And Im glad I didnt.

SNL Catches Hunger Games Fever With Josh Hutcherson

Let me state for the record that Josh Hutcherson is adorable. The child-star-turned-Hunger-Gamesheartthrob will lose none of his existing fans over last nights lackluster Saturday Night Liveepisode. Hosting for the first time at age 21, Hutcherson was a genial, smirk-free presence. Unfortunately, the same unflappable sincerity that makes him terrific in films (did you see The Kids Are All Right?) hobbles his ability to do sketch comedy, much like that sword hobbled Peetas leg in the first Hunger Games movie. Sorry, Hunger Games mania is catching. Like fire, one could say.

As for the rest of the cast, they left me wondering if it was possible to enter a tryptophan coma five days before Thanksgiving. The episode felt slight and sleepy, as if everyone was eager to wrap it up, fly home, and collapse on their parents couch. On the plus side, a few new cast members got to strut their stuff, with promising results. On to the sketches!

The Hunger Games: If Rockers Ruled Panem

Monologue: All of the episodes Catching Fire jokes were crammed into Hutchersons intro, with Kate McKinnon emerging in head-to-toe Effie Trinket couture to conduct a cast version of the Hunger Games. Dont worry, Noel, its your first year. Your name is only in the bowl once, Vanessa Bayer assures a nervous Noel Wells. When Wells gets chosen, she shakily remarks that shell at least get more stage time, at which point Cecily Strong storms the stage and yells, I volunteer as tribute! Then Kenan Thompson, in a 70s polyester suit, confuses the raffle with a key party. (Im guessing that the SNL costume department is putting this sketch on their Emmy reel. Theyve got my vote.) Hutcherson lands his best joke of the night when he tries to get the cast to simmer down, reminding them that Hunger Games is just a movie. And a book! McKinnon chimes in. Dumbfounded, he replies, Its a book?

Office Boss: Until tonight, newbie Beck Bennett had yet to do anything for SNL that was funnier than those AT&T commercials where he interviews kids. This hit the mark. Bennett plays Mr. Patterson, the CEO of the fastest-growing start-up in history, and Hutcherson is Craig, his newly-hired assistant. Youll be fine. Theres just a few things you should know about him, Kenan Thompson reassures Hutcherson. He has the IQ of a genius, he loves fantasy football, and he has the body of a baby. Sure enough, Mr. Patterson accompanies his corporate bro-speak with the physicality of a one-year-old: face-planting into furniture, shoving random objects into his mouth, and eating his spaghetti lunch by smearing it on his head. We havent seen this kind of old-school physical comedy on SNL in a while, and it feels like something Will Ferrell might have pulled off back in the day. The site of Bennett toddling across his office was, for me, the funniest moment of the whole night.

Girlfriends Talk Show: One of the better recurring sketches of 2013, the teenage gabfest Girlfriends Talk Show has settled into a nice groove. Aidy Bryant (Im the most Morgan I can be right now!) gets a little wackier with every installment, and Cecily Strong (Im Kyra to the max!) is still nailing those monologues about her psycho older boyfriend. Make no mistake, though: this is Bryants sketch. Im starting to feel a spiritual connection with her dreamy, out-of-sync Morgan, who would rather talk about miniature Christmas villages than selfies, and who has 911 in her fave fives because she cant stop reaching out to touch bees. If you cant relate, well, youre probably a witch with a b in front.

Animal Hospital: Hutchersons best character work happens in this sketch; he plays one of three cheerful veterinary nurses who casually inform people of their pets horrible deaths while handing them paperwork. There are some morbidly funny lines (Where it says pet status, Im gonna need you to write dead.'), and Aidy Bryant gets a chance to use the getting-terrible-news face thats becoming her stock in trade.

The Worst Lady on an Airplane: During the nights only Weekend Update guest appearance, Bryant gives a how-to guide to travelers who want to annoy the crap out of everyone else on the airplane. One tip: watch a movie on your laptop with headphones, and cackle hysterically at every joke. (Maam, can you keep it down? I dont know, can you make Monsters University less hilarious?) During the news segments, Seth Meyers and Cecily Strong crack two jokes about Mayor Rob Ford, which makes me wonder why Bobby Moynihans amazing impersonation didnt make a repeat appearance. Come on, SNL:how often is a crack-smoking Canadian politician in the news? Carpe diem!

Bugs: Mike OBriens short film premiered in the 12:45am slot, where the nights most oddball sketches usually go to die. On a weak night, however, this one was a highlight. OBrien plays Winston Sam Bass, a local news reporter investigating why bugs are always in such a hurry. We watch him follow live insects around with a microphone, trying to ask them probing questions; in Harlem, he interrogates a cockroach in Spanish. By the end of the segment, Bass is a broken man, quietly devastated by his failure to crack the bug code. OBrien hadnt made a big impression on me before tonight, but Id be happy to watch Winston Sam Bass investigate a few more of lifes enduring mysteries.

Thanksgiving Guest: This obligatory Thanksgiving sketch merits mention strictly on the grounds of its awfulness. Hutchersons SNL promo photos include two shots of him on a date with a turkey, and theyre both funnier than this skit based on the same premise. Vanessa Bayer is admirably committed to embodying that turkey costume (once more, props to the costume department!), but more than any sketch this season, this one feels like the cast is making it up as they go along. Kyle Mooney shouting glazed carrots! into the awkward silence pretty much sums it up.

Tonights biggest disappointment may have been the absence of commercial parodies, which is where those Hunger Games jokes would really paid off. Didnt the insane product placement surrounding the film the official Hunger Games Subway sandwich, for example inspire anybody in the writers room? Another thing that might have salvaged the evening: a Jennifer Lawrence cameo. Seeing as she just did The Daily Show on Thursday, I was hopeful that shed secretly stuck around. Ah well. At least we got to see Haim dressed like this.

SNL goes live again on December 7th for host Paul Rudd. Have a happy Thanksgiving, and remember: Friends dont let friends date turkeys.

Last Week: Lady Gaga Dives Into Character on SNL

Freddie Goes to Hollywood: How Bohemian Rhapsody Finally Got Made

When the teaser trailer for the upcoming Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody hit the Internet in May, the entire world finally got to see Mr. Robot star Rami Maleks stunning transformation into Freddie Mercury. What they didnt see was the long, torturous journey this movie took before filming wrapped which included casting dilemmas that went extremely public, the near impossible task of cramming the entire saga of a legendary rock band into a two-hour movie and the departure of director Bryan Singer near the end of the production. It was frustrating, says producer Graham King. By hook or by crook I was determined to make this movie.

The saga begins nearly a decade ago, when guitarist Brian May began mentioning a potential Queen movie that would feature Sacha Baron Cohen playing Freddie Mercury. Talks between the two camps broke down very early in the process, however; in 2016, the Borat star gave his side of the story to Howard Stern, claiming that a member of the band said that Mercury would die halfway through the movie. I go, What happens in the second half of the movie?' the actor said. He goes, We see how the band carries on from strength to strength. I said, Listen, not one person is going to see a movie where the lead character dies from AIDS and then you see how the band carries on.' (May emphatically denied Cohens version of events at the time.)

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Sacha was never officially attached to this project, King says. I never thought Freddie could be played by a white actor. And there was never a script where Freddie Mercury dies halfway through the movie. Never. I kept my mouth shut through that whole thing, but Ill go official on that now.

There was briefly talk of Ben Winshaw taking on the part, but that changed when Kings fellow producer Denis OSullivan phoned in one day and said three words: I found Freddie. He sent over a video of Malek doing his best Mercury. I was like, Thats him,' says King. Done. Found him. There was never a second look or waiver from our side that this guy wasnt Freddie Mercury.

That sort of enthusiasm was completely shocking to Malek. I thought someone was playing a joke on me, he says. But when I spoke to Graham I got the sense this could actually be real. That was flooring. I felt massive excitement [which] was followed by the extreme, daunting weight of the thing. It felt like something that could go away in a heartbeat.

To prep for the role, Malek got his hands on as many Queen books, documentaries and interview clips as he possibly could. He also spoke to Brian May and Roger Taylor in great detail about their bandmate. They told me he was the peacemaker, he says. You could tell there was a unique bond between them that will exist throughout time in their music. It was a beautiful thing to get it from them in person and see how much they cared for him.

Getting into character also required extensive work with a movement coach to nail his distinct dance moves and a dialogue coach to get the accent right. He also was fitted with prosthetic teeth because Mercury had a famous overbite and four extra upper teeth. He had a real insecurity about that, says Malek. If you watch an interview with him you see how often hes trying to cover up his teeth with his lips or his hand.

One thing he couldnt recreate, however, was Mercurys singing voice. Most singing scenes in the movie rely on either vocal stems from Queen master tapes or new recordings by Marc Martel, a Canadian Christian rock singer whose voice is practically identical to the late frontmans. Literally, you could close your eyes and its Freddie, says King. And thats a very tough thing to do.

And long before Malek signed on, the filmmakers wrestled with basic questions about the screenplay. How much of Mercurys pre-fame life should be shown? How much time should be devoted to his personal life and sexuality? Should the audience see Mercury in the final years of life as AIDS ate away at his body? It was just about getting the balance right of the storytelling, says King. It was a very complicated film to put together.

In the end, they decided to center the movie around the groups historic set at Live Aid, which is recreated in stunning detail near the climax of the movie. Great attention is paid to key moments like the painstaking recording process for Bohemian Rhapsody, but the story doesnt extend beyond 1985. We felt there was no need to go up to his death, says King. We didnt want to go that dark. What we did want to do was really do get into the underbelly of Queen and how they worked together and how they put these amazing library of songs together.

Shortly before filming wrapped, director Bryan Singer left the project after persistent rumors he was clashing with the cast and crew. Dexter Fletcher finished it off, though Singer will receive sole credit. I felt a little bit like Freddie throwing hurdles at me all the way during this film, says King. Of course it was hard [when Singer left the project], but it was what it was. We were never going to not finish the film.

When they did wrap, Malek says he had an even greater respect for Mercurys talents than he did at the beginning. Heres a man that would sing We Are The Champions in an arena to thousands of people and theyre all singing it back to him, he notes. His ability to unify people, no matter who they are, was so far ahead of its time. I cant think of anyone else that was capable of that.

Premiere: James Francos Motown-Inspired Love in the Old Days

Ill tell you this: its always weird to talk about a new thing, James Franco says, stopping a previous train of thought in its tracks. I know I do a lot of things. Im very aware of that. Im sure there are a lot of skeptical people, hearing about me doing music . . . To me, it all comes from a similar place. Its like using different tools to express things in different ways.

Sure enough, MotorCity, the debut EP from Daddy, Francos collaboration with musician Tim OKeefe, has roots in several of the near-compulsively multifaceted actors interests. Sonically, it owes its palette to the Motown Franco immersed himself in during a stay in Detroit to film Oz: The Great and Powerful, and to the obscure soul tracks he came across either in stuff he was watching, like Blue Valentine and Breaking Bad, or simply through his iTunes Genius recommendations.

Lyrically it can be traced back to the masters degree in poetry he earned at Warren Wilson College, where he learned to think of writing in rhythmic terms. The final piece of the puzzle was a car ride with OKeefe, a classmate and collaborator from his stint in grad school at the Rhode Island School of Design, where the Motown on the radio gave their long-gestating musical collaboration new shape and purpose.

The result is Daddy, which OKeefe says is less a band than a way to make all kinds of art out of whatever theyre into at the time. The way we come at it is not to be a band creating a record, but from a wider artistic approach looking at different genres of music, different periods of time, really studying it, and then creating work influenced and inspired by that.

Love in the Old Days, the lead single from MotorCity (which drops September 25th), neatly demonstrates Daddys approach. The video, directed by Franco and edited by Bruce Thierry Cheung, is an Instagram kaleidoscope of frolicking summer girls, until the last-moment insertion of Francos parents wedding photos pierces the nostalgic haze with something uniquely personal. Its the same trick Francos spoken-word lyrics accomplish, his amiable baritone mythologizing his folks Sixties-style love affair over a gentle, reverbed groove, only to write off the possibility of ever experiencing anything like it himself.

Franco says he was playing with that same kind of juxtaposition when he asked Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens, Ashley Benson and Rachel Korine, his costars from Harmony Korines debauched crime flick Spring Breakers, to pose for the EPs cover art (complete with fake Daddy tattoos). If it was four unknowns on that cover, maybe itd just be purely this sexual thing. But when theyre in that movie, the fact that theyre on Disney shows carries a lot of weight. Something extras going on behind the characters theyre playing.

MotorCity also includes Cant Say GoodBye, a short-and-sweet ode to getting dumped with a weirdly hypnotic string section; and Crime, a song characterizing an ex as a crime I had to commit, which appears in its original form and as a remix by OKeefe. For that extra touch of Motor City authenticity, Crime features guest vocals by none other than Motown legend Smokey Robinson, whose keening falsetto found its way into the song after he and Franco had a chance meeting on an airplane.

We were pulling into the gate, and I woke up, and there was this man standing over me saying Hey, I just want you to know Im a big fan of your work,' Franco recalls. His eyes were so striking. I had just watched a documentary about the history of Motown on the drive to the airport, and there he was.

Oscars 2017: Moonlight, Warren Beatty and the Perfect Hollywood Ending

Forget it, Jake its La La Land.

No wait, sorry, theres been a mistake. its Moonlight! Our bad.

What a glorious only-in-Hollywood fiasco, and what a sublimely insane ending to an Oscar night for the ages. It was just like the end of Bonnie and Clyde: Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway bask in each others glow, theres suddenly an awkward silence, they share a moment of doomed erotic eye contact and then oh, the carnage. The only thing missing was some sad banjo music. The Best Picture screw-up was a magnificent triumph of live TV, starring two of the greatest movie stars ever the kind of beautiful disaster only the Oscars could deliver. That was absolutely perfect. If you didnt savor every second of that moment, maybe you just dont like movies.

This was a Lana Del Rey song of an Oscar night, except with a tragic final verse that rhymes Faye Dunaway with baby, put your smoking gun away, or maybe Bonnie and Clydewith spritzer spiked with cyanide. No matter how many times you re-watch that final 10-minute meltdown, its still hard to believe, like a lost outtake from The Bodyguard. The La La Land crew made their acceptance speeches, a guy with an earpiece holding the red envelope came around whispering in ears, then La La producer Jordan Horowitz made the announcement that an unprecedented pooch-grope just happened. Should we blame Price Waterhouse? Faye? Warren? Why not chalk it up to the Magic of the Movies that we kept hearing about all night? Because this instant-classic moment seemed to mash up decades of Hollywood history, given the illustrious legacy on display. You could picture Howard Beale from Network emerging onstage to rant, I want you to get up right now, open your windows, stick your head out and yell: 20th Century Women wasnt even nominated?'

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The biggest shock was how the La La Land and Moonlight teams showed such valiant grace under pressure, displaying mutual respect and admiration, salvaging what could have been a miserable scene. Horowitz looked happy for Moonlight, just as Barry Jenkins gave his respects toLa La Land. Everyone involved came out looking cooler and more majestic. It was a touching moment of artists looking out for each other, responding to an unimaginable sticky gaffe with adult courtesy and heart, acting like true artists on a night when movie people can often seem like squabbling prom queens. But lets face it, the scene was also comedy gold the most priceless Oscar fuck-up ever, and the greatest heist Bonnie and Clyde ever pulled. Sacheem Littlefeather tangoing for Marlon Brando, David Niven getting upstaged by a streaker, John Travolta giving it up to Adele Dazeem these look a little small time in comparison. Really, the only losers in this situation were the scribes who spent months polishing their Moonlight got robbed thinkpieces. Among the shocked-looking faces in the crowd: Warrens sister Shirley MacLaine, standing next to Charlize Theron. City of stars, indeed.

The whole night belonged to Moonlight and La La Land,
two totally different movies that deserve better than to get pitted
against each other in a phony authentic serious art vs. fluffy chick
flicks binary. Im glad Moonlight won, but Ryan Gosling getting all listens to Mingus Ah Um once is considerably more entertaining than Non-Goslings explaining why they deserve a woke cookie for not liking a
movie that (whatever its failings in terms of jazz history) gave us the
sight of the star with a keytar doing A Flock of Seagulls I Ran. It
was easily the best song in that musical, and that wasnt even one of the 10 best Flock of Seagulls songs. Really, La La Land might
have won Best Picture if theyd gone for a full Seagulls score: Space
Age Love Song for the Griffith Observatory scene, Its Not Me Talking
for the audition scene, Wishing over the end credits.

Jimmy Kimmel did a clever job as host in the year the networks decided to use the Big Three award shows to pimp their own late-night franchises, Kimmel easily outclassed James Corden at the Grammys or Jimmy Fallon at the Golden Globes. Instead of doing a big political joke-dump at the start, he tossed darts all through the night, from Black people saved NASA and white people saved jazz to Dr. Strange was nominated for outstanding visual effects and was also named Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. He also got a lot of welcome help from Matt Damon. His tour-bus stunt was a bore, yet even that was redeemed by King Denzel performing an impromptu wedding ceremony for a couple of tourists.

The fun started on the red carpet, with Michael Strahan in a purple velvet tux interviewing sugar-titted sleazebag Mel Gibson about his latest comeback, while Mel groped his date, who looked like she was blinking help in Morse code. The lucky gal, who just gave birth to the Hacksaw Ridge directors ninth child last month, was born in 1990, the week Die Hard 2 was released. (The same year Mel starred in Hamlet, the version Alicia Silverstone quotes inClueless. In Alicias words, Ugh, as if.)

Isabelle Huppert was the essence of French so-over-it glam, to the point where winning the Oscar only could have dimmed her luster. She beamed all night like a Roxy Music album cover come to life. Meryl Streep sat in the front row with the regal attitude Jack Nicholson used to bring to his annual front-row duties. Whatever you think of Meryls latest movies, she is crushing it in her current phase as grande dame of award shows, a role that used to seem clumsy for her it was a treat to watch Meryl munch Junior Mints and nuzzle with Javier Bardem. Her front-row neighbor Denzel was awesomely pissed at losing the Best Actor award to Casey Affleck, whose excruciating beard-chew of a speech was like listening to three Fleet Foxes songs in a row.

Viola Davis tearful acceptance for Fences was a classic in itself. Other great speeches came from Mahershala Ali, Emma Stone, Kenneth Lonergan and really, everyone who wasnt Casey Affleck. The most moving by a long shot, however, was Moonlight writers Barry Jenkins and Tarell Alvin McCraney dedicating the award to all the black and brown boys and girls and non-gender-conforming. Iranian director Asghar Farhadi, who won for The Salesman, wrote a powerful statement denouncing the Muslim ban. Lin-Manuel Miranda got to perform just a couple lines of his Moana song; this was less airtime than Seth Rogen and Michael J. Fox singing Schuyler Sisters from Hamilton. Shirley MacLaine did a delightfully odd cameo to celebrate The Apartment (a movie always worth celebrating) alongside Charlize Theron, who testified that watching that Billy Wilder movie on her 17th birthday inspired her to become an actress and slap the crap out of Teri Hatcher in 2 Days in the Valley. Well, as Shirley would say, thats the way it crumbles, cookie-wise.

John Legend sang the winning La La Land theme, a counterpoint to how he played against type as the movies bad guy as clever a stunt as Paul Simon stealing the girl in Annie Hall or Marshall Crenshaw playing Buddy Holly as a smug prima donna in La Bamba. The In Memoriam montage had Sara Bareilles singing Both Sides Now. (Wait, they know Joni is still kicking, right?) It ended with Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher, as Princess Leia uttered May the Force be with you. It looked like this years Oscar gala might reach a tasteful and respectable conclusion. And then came that ending what a mess. One things for sure: Marisa Tomei is finally vindicated for all time. Ever since she won Best Supporting Actress in 1992 for My Cousin Vinny, conspiracy fiends have questioned whether Jack Palance read her name off the teleprompter instead of looking at the envelope. (She beat Judy Davis, Vanessa Redgrave, Miranda Richardson and Joan Plowright.) Now we finally know what reallyhappens if somebody announces the wrong winners name. There must be some way to make it up to Marisa Tomei maybe next year she can get her own I inspired Charlize! cameo.

Respect is due, because only mega-legends on the level of Warren and Faye could have made this moment such a towering inferno as live-TV snafus go; some 50 years after Bonnie and Clyde, theyre still robbing banks. I love them both more than words can say Ive lost count of how many times Ive watched the Eighties TV movie Beverly Hills Madam just to see Faye yell, Discretion! Thats what they pay us for! at Donna Dixon. Price Waterhouse officially took the blame, though well all keep Zapruder-ing the footage to play Wheres the envelope? (Kimmel has another theory about what went wrong: Warren Beatty has had so much sex he cant think about it right.) But I love tragically fucked-up and glamorous award shows the way Ryan Gosling loves vintage Monk vinyl, and this was one for the history books. So heres to the artists whose work got celebrated. And heres also to Warren and Faye, who proved that Hollywood is a place where glamour will always conquer good sense, and where true stars obey no rules but their own.

From gamechanging wins to even more historic screw-ups, the good, the bad and the WTFugly of that unbelievable Academy Awards ceremony.

Celebrity Apprentice Recap: Nice Guys Finish Second

For the past three months, viewers have borne witness to what has become a winning formula in reality TV: loudmouthed, oftentimes obnoxious people bickering with one another. That it happens to be celebrities and b-list ones, at that in the case of The Celebrity Apprentice might just explain why Donald Trumps long-running show has been so damn popular. This season, which wrapped on Sunday, was no different; a cast of 18 celebrities (more than ever!) were assigned entry-level tasks, project managers raised money for their charities and, of course, feelings were hurt and egos stomped upon. Basically, it had all the trappings of a great show.

Now we stand at the end. And two contestants remain: late-night legend Arsenio Hall and American Idol runner-up Clay Aiken. The final episode was billed as a live finale. All this meant is that Donald Trump would gather a bunch of snooty people at the American Museum of Natural History, bring out the fired contestants for tell-all deliciousness and, after a few hours of delay, crown the winner.

After Trump arrives at the live finale by way of a cheesy intro that sees him in the backseat of an Indy car with Mario Andretti, we pick up from last week. In the previous episode, both finalists were given their final task. First, however, they had to divvy up a crop of their previously-fired peers and make teams. After doing so, it was time to plan a charity event, work on a PSA and begin putting together a variety show. Ultimately, the host of the best charity event would take the Celebrity Apprentice crown and $250,000 for his charity.

On Team Arsenio, Adam Carolla hired an L.A. video team to put together the teams PSA. Halls charity was the Magic Johnson Foundation, so he thought it essential that Johnson himself appear in the ad. Carollas video team shot the footage of Johnson out in California, but when it arrived in New York, they discovered it had been shot at the wrong angle. Of course, only a few minutes into the show, Hall and Carolla discover theres a better take of Johnson, and all is well.

On Team Clay, there was tension between Debbie Gibson and Aiken; the disagreement hinged on Gibson getting her cousin, a painter, to come draw a mural for the teams event. But Aiken wanted to first see the cousins work before agreeing to let her paint. Again, all is quickly resolved when Gibson shows Aiken some of her cousins previous work. OK, so now what? Weve got nearly two hours to kill.

Both teams put the finishing touches on their parties Aikens has a carnival theme and Halls is, well, just a party. The teams also have 75 tickets to sell for charity. Big donors shell out cash to both squads. Aiken gets $10K from fellow Idol alum Kelly Clarkson; Hall snags $15K from Jay Leno and $5K from Chris Rock and George Lopez, respectively. Both parties, separated by only a curtain, are quite successful. Midway through the shindigs, the curtain falls and all congregate to watch both teams variety shows. Hall, having the likes of Carolla and Lisa Lampanelli on his team, opts for a comedy routine that, albeit a bit raunchy, goes over well. Aiken, meanwhile, has Gibson, Aubrey ODay and Dee Snider on his squad, so naturally his is a musical performance. Aiken has a slight edge here; his teams performance is surprisingly sharp, with Snider and Gibson duetting on Were Not Gonna Take It before Aiken croons to (Ive Had) The Time of My Life.

Cut back to the live finale. Trump brings out the fired contestants and wants their take on the season. Heres a brief rundown of what they think: People think its funny that Lou Ferrigno says 110 percent a lot; Dayana Mendoza still hates Lampanelli; Victoria Gotti also hates Lisa; Patricia Velasquez is still sad she didnt win money for her charity; Tia Carrere hates you guessed it Lisa.

Its time for our final boardroom. First, who raised more money? Its Aiken by a long shot ($301,500 to Halls $167,100, to be exact). Before Trump grills the finalists and announces his decision, its time for an extremely odd Lean on Me duet by Aiken and Hall.

OK, now that thats out of the way, its game time! Aiken tells Trump hes exceeded his own expectations. Hall wants a late-night show and says hes been playing in honor of his late cousin. Ive never been so torn, Trump says of his tough decision. But he has to choose, right? OK. So whos it gonna be? Trump beings, The winner of The Celebrity Apprentice is . . . ARSENIO HALL!

Oh, snap! Hall takes it! Thats two runner-up finishes for Aiken. Ouch!

So there you have it, people. If this doesnt revive Halls career, were thinking nothing will. Ah, the beauty of The Celebrity Apprentice: giving has-beens one more shot at a career that never was since 2008.

Last episode: Transparency

The National Build Intensity on Conan

After a playing a daylight set before thousands of fans last weekend at Outside Lands in San Francisco, the National took on a more intimate gig last night when they performed on a dimly lit stage onConan. The band played "This Is the Last Time," and singer Matt Berninger harmonized with his bandmates over drummer Bryan Devendorf's unerring rhythm and sparks of guitar from Aaron Dessner and Bryce Dessner as the song built in volume and intensity. "This Is the Last Time" comes from the National's most recent album, Trouble Will Find Me, which came out in May.

Deadpool 2 Stuntwoman Killed in Motorcycle Crash on Set

A stuntwoman was killed on the Vancouver set of Deadpool 2 Monday while filming a sequence involving a motorcycle in the Canadian city.

CTV News Vancouver reports that the stuntwoman, whose name was withheld by authorities, lost control of her motorcycle while filming the stunt and crashed through the ground floor window of nearby Shaw Tower.

An ambulance loaded the victim to take her to the hospital, but the emergency vehicle remained at the scene for 45 minutes before pulling away with its lights and sirens off. Vancouver police announced soon after that the stuntwoman had died following the accident.

Vancouver Police can confirm that a female stunt driver has died on the set of Deadpool during a stunt on a motorcycle, Vancouver police said in a statement, adding that they were investigating the incident alongside WorkSafeBC.

The victim is believed to be the stunt double for Deadpool 2 and Atlanta actress Zazie Beetz, who plays Domino in the 2018 sequel.According to Entertainment Weekly, the stuntwoman was wearing the same clothes and riding the same Ducati motorcycle Beetz was photographed in just days ago

The death on the Deadpool 2 set comes a month after a stuntman was killed in an on-set accident while shooting The Walking Dead in Atlanta. Production on the zombie series eighth season was temporarily halted following the death of John Bernecker after he fell 20 feet off a balcony and onto a concrete floor.

Stunt accident on set of Deadpool 2. Witnesses say motorcycle crashed through window of Shaw Tower near Jack Poole Plaza. @CTVVancouver pic.twitter.com/TJoLYRHcHT

Ben Miljure (@CTVNewsBen) August 14, 2017

Sony CEO Defends Interview Decision: We Have Not Caved

Michael Lynton, the CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment, says that the situation surrounding the studios decision to cancel the release of The Interview is more complicated than it seems, according toThe Hollywood Reporter. In an interview with CNN that will air later tonight, the exec said that the public was unaware of the amount of resistance Sony was getting on a large scale, regarding the movies release in the wake of cyber-terrorist threats.

I think actually the unfortunate part is, in this instance, the president, the press and the public are mistaken as to what actually happened, he said. We do not own movie theaters. We cannot determine whether or not a movie will be played in movie theaters.

He then broke down the series of events, as he saw it, that led up to President Obama criticizing Sony in a recent speech. We experienced the worst cyber-attack in American history and persevered for three and a half weeks under enormous stress and enormous difficulty, he said. The movie theaters came to us one by one over the course of a very short time we were very surprised by it they announced that they would not carry the movie. At that point in time, we had no alternative to not proceed with a theatrical release on the 25th of December. We have not caved. We have not given in. We have persevered.

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When pressed about alternative ways to release the movie, Lynton said that there is still hope yet. There are a number of options open to us and we have considered those and are considering them, he said. As it stands right now while there have been a number of suggestions that we go out there and deliver this movie digitally or through VOD, there has not been one major VOD video on demand distributor one major e-commerce site that has stepped forward and said they are willing to distribute this movie for us. Again, we dont have that direct interface with the American public so we need to go through an intermediary to do that.

Earlier today, Obama called Sonys decision to cancel the Christmas Day release a mistake, saying that as a society, we should not bow to the demands of a dictator. Im sympathetic that Sony, as a private company, was worried about liabilities and this and that and the other, the President said. I wish theyd spoken to me first. I would have told them, Do not get into a pattern in which youre intimidated by these kinds of criminal attacks.'

Yesterday, Sony released a statement that said it had no further plans to release the picture.

On Wednesday, after a group calling itself Guardians of Peace which was responsible for hacking into Sonys e-mail system and is linked to North Korea hinted at a 9/11-style attack on theaters that screened the movie, Sony decided to cancel the release of The Interview, which depicts an assassination attempt on North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong-un.

The decision followed an offer on the part of Sony for theaters to decide not to screen the film. After five major theater chains backed out, Sony pulled the plug. We respect and understand our partners decision and, of course, completely share their paramount interest in the safety of employees and theatergoers, the company said in a statement.

Lyntons full interview with CNNs Fareed Zakaria will air on Anderson Cooper 360 tonight at 8 p.m. EST.

In addition to Lyntons statements, the company has released a new statement, addressing criticism that it it censored itself as well asits plans about a possible future release. It reads in full below via Buzzfeed:

Sony Pictures Entertainment is and always has been strongly committed to the First Amendment. For more than three weeks, despite brutal intrusions into our company and our employees personal lives, we maintained our focus on one goal: getting the film The Interview released. Free expression should never be suppressed by threats and extortion.

The decision not to move forward with the December 25th theatrical release of The Interview was made as a result of the majority of the nations theater owners choosing not to screen the film. That was their decision.

Let us be clear the only decision that we have made with respect to the release of the film was not to release it on Christmas Day in theaters, after theater owners declined to show it. Without theaters, we could not release it in the theaters on Christmas Day. We had no choice.

After that decision, we immediately began actively surveying alternatives to enable us to release the movie on a different platform. It is still our hope that anyone who wants to see this movie will get the opportunity to do so.

Watch Michael Moore Parse Madness of Trump Era in Fahrenheit 11/9 Trailer

Michael Moore tries to parse the chaos of Donald Trumps presidency in the first trailer for his new documentary, Fahrenheit 11/9. The film opens September 21st.

In the clip, Moore dubs Trump the last president of the United States, and much of the trailer highlights the increasingly polarized nature of American politics under Trump. Theres footage of KKK and neo-Nazis burning crosses and swastikas juxtaposed with an interview with Parkland shooting survivor and activist David Hogg. One moment, informal Trump advisor Roger Stonewarns about a violent uprising if Congress tries to impeach Trump, while the next rising progressive star Alexandria Ocasio-Cortezknocks on doors and hands out fliers.

Here's the exclusive trailer forMichael Moore's (@MMFlint) newest documentary "Fahrenheit 11/9." It's in theaters Sept. 21. pic.twitter.com/eHLPy1J9o4

HuffPost (@HuffPost) August 9, 2018

Moore announced Fahrenheit 11/9 last spring. The films title is both a reference to the day after the 2016 election, as well as a play on Moores scathing 2004 film about George W. Bush and the Iraq War, Fahrenheit 9/11.

Fahrenheit 11/9 marks Moores second film about Trump, following his surprise 2016 movie, Michael Moore in TrumpLand. The 73-minute feature documented a live show Moore performed in October 2016 in Wilmington, Ohio, the seat of Clinton County, which ended up voting overwhelmingly for Trump.

Hating Seth MacFarlane: A Timeline

He was one of the youngest TV executive producers in the mediums history, created not one but two successful animated programs, hosted the Oscars and had a blockbuster comedy bring in beaucoup box office receipts. He has contributed $1 million to the Reading Rainbow kickstarter fund and produced the recent reboot of the classic science series Cosmos; Harvard named him their2011 Humanist of the Year. Yet Seth MacFarlane has managed to inspire an intense, rabid hatred of his raunchy comedy and retro-dude attitudes thats been as fervent as the fanbase that brought the canceled Family Guy back to life. Its a sentiment that seemed to reach a fever pitch this past weekend with the poorly received release ofTed 2 the sequel to his2012 hit thats garnered its fair share of condemnation for a racial-allegory story about the titular profane teddy bears attempts to be legally recognized as a person.

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Those criticisms are the latest in a long line of censures for the 41-year-old filmmaker, whos been the target of scorn and ridicule ever since he first hit it big in TV animation. Call it Sethenfreude: the irrepressible urge to hate on MacFarlane, which as our timeline indicates, has been steadily escalating for the past 16 years.

1999-2000: Family Guy
An offshoot of MacFarlanes Life of Larry, his thesis film at the Rhode Island School of Design, Family Guy scored a prestigious premiere slot directly after Super Bowl XXXIII; Fox had hoped to make the show about an Archie Bunker-like loudmouth part of a primetime-animation one-two punch. From the very beginning, however, the show was immediately savaged for its juvenile, scattershot and often-bigoted absurdity elements that would become both its, and MacFarlanes, calling card. In particular, the shows crude humor attracted the ire of Entertainment Weeklys TV critic.

Family Guy about dumbbell dad Peter Griffin, his wife, three children, and dog is The Simpsons as conceived by a singularly sophomoric mind that lacks any reference point beyond other TV shows. . .the acclaim for writer-artist-actor MacFarlane (who does three regular voices on the show) is shaping up to be the hollowest hype of the year. Ken Tucker, Entertainment Weekly, 4/9/99

When it came time for EWs worst shows of the list, guess what Tucker singled out? The write-up would help spark a long-running feud between the critic and MacFarlane (including some choice Family Guy episode digs at Tucker), and contributed to the notion that the comic was thin-skinned and vindictive in addition to someone who traded in wannabe-extreme offensiveness.

Racist, anti-Semitic, and AIDS jokes; shoddy animation; stolen ideas: the cartoon as vile swill. Ken Tucker, Entertainment Weekly, 12/24/99

Not surprisingly, the show attracted the ire of several TV watchdog groups, including the Parents Television Council, whove objected to the shows tendency to push the envelope of good taste. They petitioned Fox to drop the show as early as 2000; the network eventually did give the series the axe after three seasons in 2003, due to low ratings.

2003-2004: Cartoonists Arent Impressed, Part 1
As the shows reruns began to air on the Cartoon Networks Adult Swim block and attract a new fanbase, other cartoonists began to air their dissent including The Simpsons producer Al Jean (To be honest, I thought it was a little too derivative of The Simpsons to the point where I would see jokes we did, he told the UGO Networks. They should be more original.) and Ren & Stimpy creator John Kricfalusi (If youre a kid wanting to be a cartoonist today, and youre looking at Family Guy, you dont have to aim very high. You can draw [that show] when youre 10 years old, he said in a Cartoon Brew interview. The standards are extremely low.) MacFarlane ended up getting the last laugh, thanks to the DVDs of the first few seasons bringing in record number of sales and Fox resurrecting the now-popular series to higher ratings.

2005-2006: Family Guy Returns; Cartoonists Arent Impressed, Part 2
Despite the renewed interest in the show (and Fox greenlighting a second successful MacFarlane series, American Dad), the show remained the same: boorish, boundary-pushing, ready to tackle controversial subjects for controversys sake and more than willing to pander to the lowest-common denominator for a laugh. Several critics responded in kind notably the Philadelphia Inquirers Jonathan Storm, who called it [an] infantile sleaze-a-thon (4/30/05).

Naturally, the vitriol was directed primarily at MacFarlane for indulging in xenophobic jokes and pop-culture-referencing cutaways for no apparent reason a notion spoofed in a South Park episode that imagined the shows writing staff as manatees randomly assembling nouns, verbs and celebrity names to form the shows jokes.

According to South Parks Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the episode Cartoon Wars (4/12/2006) generated a lot of backslapping from fellow Family Guy haters in the industry.

When we did the Muhammad episode, we got flowers from the Simpsons people because we ripped on Family Guy. Then we got calls from the King of the Hill people saying, Youre doing Gods work ripping on Family Guy. Even though it was this big political thing about Muhammad and whatever, everyone was just, Thank you for you ripping on Family Guy.' Trey Parker, interview with Reason.com, 12/5/2006

2011: Music Is Better Than Words
A classically trained singer who often embellished Family Guy with lavish musical numbers, MacFarlane channeled his lifelong love of Sinatra-era tunes into a 2011 album of Forties and Fifites covers, Music is Better Than Words (on which he used one of Ol Blue Eyes actual microphones). The album earned a few Grammy nominations, though some critics largely saw it as further proof of MacFarlanes smarmy look-at-me ego, his knack for plagiarism and his general sense of phoniness a second-hand Rat Pack-era suit draped over a classless act.

The result is alternately audacious and befuddling . . . Devotees will search in vain for the necrophilia punch lines, while Sinatra fans will search in vain for a plausible explanation. Have fun rebooting The Flintstones, asshole. Garrett Kamps, Spin, 9/27/11

A vanity project that evades any rational explanationMacFarlane is so concerned about inhabiting Sinatras silken suits he doesnt really care about the meaning of the songs; all that matters is sounding like Ol Blue Eyes, which MacFarlane does about as well as any number of hotel lounge singers this world over. Sure, its a surprise that he can carry a tune, but its no surprise that MacFarlane, who came to fame and fortune by telling obvious jokes so slowly a dog could understand, considers his competence as proof of his excellence, his smugness bearing no swagger, his self-satisfaction undercutting his otherwise perfectly pleasant surroundings. Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide, 2011

2012: That New Yorker Profile; Ted
Claire Hoffmans 2012 New Yorker profile, timed to MacFarlanes live-action film debut Ted, painted the comedian as a Hollywood celebrity obsessed with his own appearance and wealth. (He eats caviar! He lives in an opulent mansion!). He also comes off as someone who arrogantly shrugged off accusations of sexism and racism by claiming that he was actually using insulting jokes to make fun of intolerance. It bolstered the idea of MacFarlane as a poseur too vain to be truly self-aware.

We are presenting the Archie Bunker point of view and making fun of the stereotypesnot making fun of the groups, he said. But if Im really being honest, then maybe theres a part of me thats stuck in high school and were laughing because were not supposed to. I dont know the psychology. At the core, I know none of us gives a shit. Seth MacFarlane, The New Yorker, 6/18/12

Ted was a box-office smash: its $219 million domestic haul is eighth highest ever for an R-rated feature. However, to many, it was reconfirmation of the writer-directors predilection for bad-taste jokes imbued with an unmistakable measure of defensiveness; objecting to them somehow made one a stuffy prude or an old fogey. To an even greater degree than his prior work, the movie also highlighted that he was an equal-opportunity offender only when it came to people (including those suffering from ALS) who didnt look or think like him.

Seth MacFarlane does seem like the person who would use the term political correctness as a relevant pejorative in the year 2012The jokes in Ted are equal-opportunity sluggish: The inoffensive ones are just as limp and tired as the offensive onesTed is soulless, angry-white-guy comedy at its worst. Honestly: This is a smug, nasty little number. Will Leitch, Deadspin, 6/26/12

2013: The Oscars
MacFarlanes 2013 Oscar-hosting gig was something of a disaster, what with its less-than-winning bits about blackface and its crass song We Saw Your Boobs. On Hollywoods biggest stage, he exposed his greatest shortcomings: a fondness for self-referential gags, a love for derogatory (but supposedly all-in-good-fun!) one-liners about women, gays and minorities, and enormous song-and-dance set pieces all of which were infused with an overpowering whiff of MacFarlane self-satisfaction.

MacFarlane was uncomfortable, smarmy, unfunny and not even bad in any memorably creative wayThe problem and the problem with his whole table-setting performance is: first, a metajoke about telling an unfunny joke is still an unfunny joke. And second, the Oscars are not about the host. James Poniewozik, Time, 2/25/13

Oscars fans have seen a lot over the years, but this may be the first time theyve ever seen a host use the awards to audition for his own variety showAwash in self-indulgence, neither he nor his 3-hour-and-35-minute show ever seemed to hit a comfortable, confident stride. Robert Bianco, USA Today, 2/25/13

The jokes just got more and more well, whats the word? Calling them offensive gives them too much power, which isnt to say that black people shouldnt have felt uncomfortable about MacFarlane pretending to mix up Denzel Washington and Eddie Murphy, or that half the population neednt have squirmed when MacFarlane called Zero Dark Thirtys plotline an example of a womans innate ability to never ever let anything go. What the jokes were, really, was stupid, boring, and empty: humor that relied less on its own patently sexist, racist, homophobic, etc. content than on admiration for or disgust with the hosts willingness to deliver it. Spencer Kornhaber, The Atlantic, 2/25/13

Lots of people like Seth MacFarlane. Many other people like watching the Oscars. But nobody likes both, not even Seth MacFarlane, who has no idea what the Oscars are. . . The poor guy couldnt read off the teleprompter without his eyes darting nervously, giggling at his zingers about how foreign people have accents, musicals are gay, etc. He kept making amateur mistakes on the level of clapping into his mike. (Lots of that.) He sang a show tune about the hot nudity in The Accused 30 seconds of Googling would have explained why that line wasnt a keeper, but obviously Seths staff was too chickenshit to give the boss any bad news. Rob Sheffield, Rolling Stone, 2/25/13

2014: A Million Ways to Die in the West
The critical and commercial underperformance of MacFarlanes Western spoof was largely a byproduct of his more-of-the-same stubbornness. Again mirroring his Family Guy and Ted templates, the movie was a dreary cornucopia of rapid-fire jokes that, whenever possible, centered on bodily fluids and raunchy sex. Compounding matters, MacFarlane, in his first headlining big-screen role, could no longer hide behind a cartoon baby or a CGI bear; here, like at the Oscars, he was the face of his smug, infantile humor.

A Million Ways to Die in the West huffs and puffs to seem daringly outrageous and too often settles for being merely gross, unless your idea of cutting-edge comedy is a close-up of a sheeps penis urinating on the hero. The scripts casual profanity has no shock value to it anymore its just how dull people talk to each other these daysthe movies content to smear excrement on a beloved genre as inoffensively as possible. Like so many funny-men before him, MacFarlane aims for the big time and makes a classic mistake: He wants us to like him. Ty Burr, The Boston Globe, 5/29/14

Picture an entire movie spawned by the campfire scene from Blazing Saddles, and youre almost there. All this will speak to your soul, no doubt, if you are a twelve-year-old boy who believes the bathroom to be the funniest place on earth, but what about the rest of us? Fear not, for MacFarlanewho co-wrote and co-produced the film, as well as starring in ithas joys in store for those of more cultivated tastes. There are gags about retarded sheep, Chinese immigrants, the halitosis that follows a blow job, and the precise appearance of the pudenda after a spell in the sex trade. As is his wont, MacFarlane is daring us to be disgusted; and, should we flinch, his movie will mock us for being prim the worst of all crimes, in his scabrous world. But what if were just bored? Anthony Lane, The New Yorker, 6/9/14

2015: Ted 2

Despite being an outspoken public supporter of equal rights for all, MacFarlanes Ted 2 has been slammed for preaching progressive acceptance on the one hand, and then indulging in his usual homos and sexually/racially degrading shtick on the other. The films box-office failure was seen by many as karmic retribution. Making matters worse, MacFarlane then went on Twitter to use the Supreme Courts groundbreaking gay-marriage decision to publicize the films release. A tone-deaf social-media marketing strategy-cum-joke, it once again suggested that hes a comedian who doesnt quite understand the difference between amusing and offensive outrageousness as well as being a tactless narcissist whos never happier than when making himself the center of inappropriate attention.

Seth MacFarlane, whose sense of humor generally bodes about as well for moviegoers as a dorsal fin does for swimmersMacFarlane would seem to identify as progressive, but he uses his liberalness conservatively, to berate what he thinks is normal or safe or established in American culture. His tolerance is tinged with intolerance. Wesley Morris, Grantland, 6/24/15

To Rome With Love

Can Woody Allen do for the Eternal City what he did for the City of Light in his Oscar-winning script for Midnight in Paris? Dont get greedy. To Rome With Love lacks the overarching theme of time and regret that distinguished Allens last romantic comedy, but it has pleasures galore. Start with a voluptuous Penlope Cruz as a hooker trying and failing hilariously to pass herself off as the wife of a new groom (Alessandro Tiberi) to fool his conservative family. Move on to the Woodman himself as a retired opera director, in Rome with his wife (Judy Davis) to meet the Italian fiance (Flavio Parenti) of their daughter (Alison Pill). It turns out the fiances undertaker father can sing like Pavarotti in the shower. No wonder, since famed tenor Fabio Armiliato plays the role. The fun uncorks when Allens bumbling American tries to bring the undertaker and his shower to the opera stage.

And so it goes in this episodic culture-clash comedy in which the laughs are decidedly hit-and-miss. Allen scores comic points at the expense of reality-show fame by casting Italys Oscar-winning clown Roberto Benigni as an ordinary guy who becomes famous for nothing until the paparazzi move on to the next nothing. But the joke wears thin.

The most touching segment features a tart and tender Alec Baldwin as a vacationing architect who encounters a younger version of himself in Jesse Eisenberg and advises him not to make the same mistakes, like having sex with the BFF (Ellen Page) of the woman you love (Greta Gerwig).

What links all these characters is Rome itself, and cinematographer Darius Khondji (Midnight in Paris) uses the city as a canvas to paint with color and light. Tourist traps are largely avoided. This is the vital city that inspired Fellini alive and lived in. When an actor falters or a joke falls flat, Roma stays fresh and dynamic. You cant take your eyes off it.

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From Jackie to Neruda: How Pablo Larrain Is Reinventing the Biopic

Yeah, man, I mean, theyre so boring. Boring, and kind of dangerous.

Pablo Larran is looking out the window of his hotel room, staring at the folks in the windows of their hotel rooms across the street from where hes staying in New York. Nothing salacious is happening, mind you; no one is getting undressed, or murdering their spouse, or jumping on top of their bed to a Beyonc song. But the 40-year-old Chilean director is still fascinated by the rows of what he calls glass movie screens facing him, several of which have their curtains open and feature the occasional appearance of people going about their daily routines. The sense of real life just happening thats what you want to capture when you make a movie, he says, and begins describing how he observed someone in a single-occupancy conducting a long Skype call earlier in the day. It was an incredible found, un-self-conscious moment. I love those.

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He turns his gaze back to the person sitting across from him. Sorry, you asked me what I thought about biopics. Like I said, theyre usually boring. I dont really like them. Larran lets the statement hang in the air for another few seconds. Which sounds odd to say to you right now, I know.

A little odd, yes, because the filmmaker in an accidental moment of market saturation is in midtown Manhattan to promote not one but two new movies that technically fall into that particular genre. The first, Jackie, focuses on Jacqueline Lee Kennedy in the days following her husbands assassination; though it drops in before moments such as her 1962 televised White House tour, the movie mostly follows the First Lady during the aftermath, from co-ordinating his funeral to conducting an interview based on Life magazines famous Camelot feature. It opened in theaters on December 2nd, it is Larrans first English-language film, and it features the sort of stunning performance from Natalie Portman thats already generating some deafening awards-season drumbeating.

The second, Neruda, finds Larran tackling the life and work of Chiles famous poet/politician Pablo Neruda, albeit with a twist. Though it features actor Luis Gnecco playing the Nobel prize-winner as hes forced to flee his home country in the 1940s, the story unfolds mostly through the eyes of a slightly incompetent fictional police inspector (Gael Garca Bernal) whos doggedly chasing him. Only a smattering of the great mans writings and speeches make it into the movie; those unfamiliar with his early years or how his Communist affiliations made him a marked man may find themselves playing catch-up. It opens this weekend, its a project that predates Jackie and, thanks to Bernals goofy-parody-of-a-hardboiled-gumshoe performance, is as much about Borgesian literary games as it is the wind of banners that passed through the poets life. For someone who dislikes screen portraits of iconic figures, Larran hasnt exactly shied away from making two of them back to back.

But his reluctance to embrace the cradle-to-grave model normally associated with such movies, and his refusal to simply rely on an iconic subjects greatest-hits collections for material, not only sets this double-shot apart from the biopic pack. He also gives credence to the growing notion that, by taking a more fragmented, expressionistic route, you actually get closer to nailing the complexity of a life famously lived. And while Larran isnt the first one to discover that a just-the-facts-maam approach can be maddeningly limited, he has made the strongest case yet for treating the biopic as the beginning of a story as opposed to the final word. By not sticking to the rules, he may be finally liberating the genre from being reduced to one regurgitated history lesson after another.

Thats exactly why I added dangerous earlier, Larrain says, in regards to that last point. Those types of movies become all about trying to pin that person down, to make a permanent record. Or its, Well, who is going to play this guy or that guy? How are they going to talk? But you cant pin Pablo Neruda or Jackie Kennedy down. You need to create a poetic mood rather than just having actors recite somebodys words in a film. You need to feel life in them. Because, otherwise, you risk being everything from tacky to stupid to irrelevant to all those other words you want to avoid being called.

In fact, when Larrans brother first approached him with the idea of doing a movie about Pablo Neruda roughly eight years ago, the filmmaker thought the notion felt impossible, and ridiculous. Hes part of landscape, our DNA in Chil. I thought, I dont have the guts to sit down and put words in the mouth of someone called Neruda. I just dont. After his third movie the breakthrough 2012 drama No, about a marketing manager (played be Bernal) working on a TV ad campaign for the nations 1988 referendum he began to warm to the idea enough that he reached out to screenwriter Guillermo Caldern. His first draft was much more conventional, Larran says. Then, as we worked on it more, somebody came up the idea of inventing Gaels character, the cop. I dont remember who thought it; I know Guillermo gets the credit, however, because he actually wrote it!

But suddenly, everything shifted, he adds. If you cant get at why Neruda is important in terms of poetry, literature and politics, theres no point. And by inventing this detective, we realized in a way that this was the best way to get at all of that.

I remember Pablo saying he might do something about Neruda when we were shooting No, Bernal says, talking about the movie in a separate interview. But by the time he finally came to me with the idea of being in the movie, things had changed drastically: Oh, so you want me to play some sort of avant-garde, film-noirstyle character whos a fascist? The kind of guy who answers a question by just smoking a cigarette? OK . That you could use humor to get at the humanity of this mans status as both a fugitive and one of the most famous poets of the 20th century its revolutionary. If you want to make a straight biographical film about where someone went and when, you can just film someones passport. The idea that you can live many lives inside of one life is a much more complex idea to tackle.

You cant pin Pablo Neruda or Jackie Kennedy down. You need to create a mood. Otherwise, you risk being everything from tacky to stupid to irrelevant.

Bernal was in as the Inspector Closeau-like cop, but first he was committed to filming a movie with Werner Herzog; Larran also had to wait for some extra financing to come through and for Gnecco, who was playing Neruda, to gain back a bunch of weight he had just dropped over a number of months. (I think Luis is still mad at me for that, the director says, putting his head in his hands.) While they were in a holding pattern, Larran and Caldern made another film The Club, a dark, twisted tale of several defrocked priests living together as a way of Church-sponsored penance that was accepted to the Berlin Film Festival. The jury foreman that year was Darren Aronofsky, who was a fan; while in Germany, he sought out Larran and told him about a script he had. It was the story of Jackie Kennedy, telling her side of an American tragedy; Aronofsky had originally been slated to direct it as a project for his ex-wife Rachel Weisz but was now on solely as a producer. He wanted Larran to direct it. The response was: Why the hell are you asking a Chilean director to do this?

His answer was, maybe this needs someone whos not American, Larran recalls. Maybe, because this wasnt my history, I would be able to see things differently. I was still sort of unsure, but then I talked to my mother, who essentially told me I had to do it. When I asked her why, she replied, Pablo, you dont understand: Shes a woman who showed strength, and thats important for every woman in the world.'

He got back to Aronofsky and said he was interested; the best person to play Jackie, he thought, would be Natalie Portman. Unbeknownst to him, the Black Swan star had already been circling the project for a long time. Shed been involved, and then she briefly wasnt involved, Larran says. That gap happened to have been when I came on, however, so when I suggested her, I thought I was being a genius. Everyone else was like, Dude, youre a little late to this party. There was something about her eyes she has the same sense of mystery that Jackie did. It just made sense.

Pablo likes to leave things unsaid, Portman says about the directors love of ambiguity, via email. But during their respective research periods leading up the production during which time Larran was filming and editing Neruda she claims there was a constant back and forth as they arrived at a mutual vision of who Jackie was. He would talk about her love of objects and of beauty; I would mention her fear of having experienced something she couldnt wholly remember. He would send me an interview where she accidentally says she doesnt love her husband; I thought she probably didnt like the public perception of her as the woman you want to marry. There were a lot of exchanges.

But when we got around to filming, she adds, he lit the entire set and had handheld cameras, so you could go wherever you want physically or emotionally. He let us be totally free (or at least feel that way), which meant you found yourself going to these really unexpected places in scenes.

Few other directors would allow such lets-see-where-this-goes explorations when faced with the daunting notion of recreating the moment that an almost universally beloved First Lady dealt with an era-changing moment. Its not until you see what Larran accomplishes with his unusual telling, however, that you realize this project probably would not have worked any other way. From the inventive use of Mica Levis droning score to giving Portman the creative space to find the person beneath the blood-splattered pink suit and steely protectiveness, his idea of throwing the usual template out the window helps him make something much more unique: an immersive, impressionistic look at grief, power and even motherhood as told through the lens of one endlessly scrutinized, Sphinx-like celebrity. As with Nerudas absurdist take on a literary giant, Jackie almost feels like its inventing a new subgenre the interior biopic.

It made her feel real, he says, regarding the stream-of-consciousness approach. More real than if I just told you what happened. Like looking at her through a window. He gestures outside.

And though Larran claims the fact that both of these skewed, subjective takes on sociopolitical giants are hitting theaters in the same month is a total fluke, he certainly doesnt the downplay the fact that, seen together, theres a connection between them. I swear to God, Ive dreamed of Neruda and Jackie sitting in a room, talking to each other, he says with a laugh. I really do think that theres a conversation going on between these two movies in a way I could not have anticipated. Or maybe its a chess match.

But it wasnt until I started doing promotion for both of these movies, he adds, and talking to people that I realized: Theyre both these sort of ungraspable figures. Ill tell you, I spent months making movies about these two people, and I still have no idea who they are. The more I dive into them, the more mysterious they are to me.