"He’s the most beloved actor I’ve ever worked with — and there’s a reason for it."

Jodie Foster on Mel Gibson (who stars in her new movie "The Beaver").

"'I can't handle a Jaguar right now.' He said that many times. 'All I want is a Chevrolet.'"

The 2d of 3 of his wives quotes or purports to quote Newt Gingrich as he spoke to the minister who was — allegedly — brought in to counsel the couple through what turned out to be their crack up.

He asked her to just tolerate the affair, an offer she refused. He'd just returned from Erie, Pennsylvania, where he'd given a speech full of high sentiments about compassion and family values. The next night, they sat talking out on their back patio in Georgia. She said, "How do you give that speech and do what you're doing?"

"It doesn't matter what I do," he answered. "People need to hear what I have to say. There's no one else who can say what I can say. It doesn't matter what I live."

I got distracted at this point in writing this post by a little boy arguing passionately toward his mother who was walking away from him out of this café. I didn't catch what the argument was about, but I could tell from his tone and a few of the words that he was making an argument based on the kind of principles that constitutional lawyers use: liberty, equality, fairness. Like grammar, these principles are built into the human brain. Just as toddlers naturally learn to speak, they learn to use these concepts to argue for what they want. The lawyerly human little boy was perhaps 3 years old.

Anyway, you don't have to be much more than 3 to call bullshit on Newt. The things husbands say to their wives! (And wives to their husbands.) Laughably unprincipled assertions that you'd never inflict on anyone other than a spouse — these words will make a fool of you if they are ever quoted to the general public. And God help you if you're caught on audiotape: "I deserve to be blown fast! Before the fucking Jacuzzi!" Ha. That never gets old. Seriously, I think the phrase "Before the Jacuzzi!" should become a witty comeback that you use to mock your spouse when he (or she) makes an argument of the sort that is only used intra-marriage and that one would never even attempt to aim at someone who wasn't maritally bound to you. "Before the Jacuzzi" = You only think you can say something like that to a human being because that human being is your spouse.

"What kind of a man is that? Hitting a woman when she’s holding a child in her hands? Breaking her teeth twice in the face! What kind of man is that?"

"Oh, you’re all angry now! You know what, you f*cking deserved it!"

The new Mel Gibson recording.

Mel Gibson teaches us that Americans are more roused by racism than misogyny (or breasts).

There's so much talk of Mel's "racist rant." I listened. Although he most certainly says the n-word and says it in a line that suggests contempt for black men, the rant is all about the woman's purportedly fake breasts. The hatred is squarely aimed at the (white) woman.

A feminist issue.

"You're a bitch"/"I didn't do anything"/"Did so."

The Mel Gibson tapes. And that's not the worst of it.

The tapes do not make it clear what the couple was arguing about.

But Mel tells Oksana, "Look what you did to me... look what you are... look what every part of you is... f**king fake... f**king fake.

"You are the most synthetic person... who the f*** are you?"

That's not the worst of it either. I excerpted the bit in the title because of the childishness of "Did so." I excerpted the other part because Gibson chose Oksana Grigorieva presumably because of and not in spite of her looks. But maybe "every part" included her soul and it was only after harsh experience that he was able to determine that that part of her was fucking fake too. But our Mel — he is not fucking fake. He's always had genuinely great looks and a genuinely horrible temper.

That divorce will cost $500 million.

But the damage to his hyper-Catholic reputation is so much worse.

10 thoughts about "The Wrestler."

1. To be fair to Marisa Tomei, it should have been titled "Meat." But "The Wrestler" is apt, because Mickey Rourke's role, as a wrestler, is much larger. But the 2 actors have equivalent parts, as human meat, making a life out of a crude display of the body. And when Rourke's character, Randy the Ram Robinson, retires from wrestling, he works at a deli counter, making up orders of sliced meat, and there is, at one point, a literal depiction of the man as meat — which I won't spoil. (Don't you hate spoiled meat?)

2. We see a lot of Marisa Tomei's naked body. It's right in our face, lap-dance style. Unlike Kate Winslet, who is always getting naked for the movie cameras, Marisa Tomei has already won an Oscar. And she is not bathed in the kind of cinematic romantic light that makes us think — as we always think when we get to gawk Kate — how beautiful and how brave. You have to struggle — crawl across the floor — to get to a feeling of respect for the actress who submitted to this script. Like the sex dancer she portrays, you think does this woman need the money so desperately?

3. Tomei and Rourke display formidable bodies topped with aging, messed up faces. In one scene, Tomei — off from work — shows up with no makeup at all. Tomei is 45 and — in her face — she looks it. Randy tells her she looks clean. She didn't look that clean, but practically nothing is clean in this movie. It's an entire world of ramshackle filth.

4. Tomei is required to utter some of the most awkward lines I have ever heard in a movie. While giving Mickey Rourke a lap dance, she has to spontaneously utter some quotes from the movie "The Passion of the Christ" and then explain that she was quoting something from the movie "The Passion of the Christ." You get the point, early on, that Randy the Ram should be understood as a Christ figure and that the narrative should be seen as The Passion. Now, you may rightly wonder why. Movies often cue us to understand a character as a Christ figure, but what is The Ram suffering for?

5. Randy the Ram. Get it? Christ is the Lamb. And The Wrestler is the Ram. O, ram of God, who... who what? Redeems us of our last shred of dignity?

6. The Ram is scourged like mad. I haven't seen "The Passion of the Christ," so I can't tell you how close the various shots in that movie might be to the shots in Mel Gibson's magnum opus. But that cut to the forehead — crown of thorns, right? — even if it is self-inflicted. Getting staple-gunned all over his body? You just know that if the Romans had had staple guns, they would have staple-gunned Christ all over his body. (If that had happened, the staple would now be a holy symbol. Link to the script for "Lenny," wherein Lenny Bruce says "Good thing we nailed him when we did, because if we had done it within the last years, we'd have to contend with generations of parochial schoolkids with little electric chairs hanging around their necks." And here's the corresponding Bizarro cartoon.)

7. I've been noting a Hollywood trend of delivering pedophiliac titillation with artistic prettification. But "The Wrestler" does not fit the trend. The sex in the movie is completely adult — and it's also grubby and ugly. There are children in the movie too, though, and Randy the Ram actually plays with them. He wants to retain his self-esteem as a wrestling hero, so he play wrestles with them, gives one an action figure of himself, and lures another one into his shabby trailer to play an old Ninetendo game (in which he is a character). In real life, people seeing that evidence would suspect the man is a pedophile, but in the movie, he is absolutely not.

8. This movie belongs on a list titled "Movies With Scenes in a Supermarket Aisle." (I'd love some help compiling this list — and also a sub-list "Movies With Scenes in a Supermarket Cereal Aisle."

9. Of all the things that made me voice the syllable best transliterated as "ugh" — one of them was egg salad.

10. I know people want me to say, when I do one of these lists, whether I am recommending the movie.

ADDED: Re #9:

AND: Mickey Rourke talks about making the movie: Part 1, Part 2.

UPDATE: This post memorializes my first date with Meade, on January 17, 2009.

The Farrelly brothers are making a 3 Stooges movie.

"Over the years such A-list Stoogephiles as Russell Crowe and Mel Gibson have been mentioned for the movie, but no casting has been announced."

Any ideas?

What are the new classics?

Entertainment Weekly does a very nice job of ranking the new classics — movies, TV, etc. — from the last 25 years. From the movie list:

1. Pulp Fiction (1994)
7. Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
10. Moulin Rouge (2001)
11. This Is Spinal Tap (1984)
12. The Matrix (1999)
13. GoodFellas (1990)
14. Crumb (1995)
15. Edward Scissorhands (1990)
16. Boogie Nights (1997)
17. Jerry Maguire (1996)
18. Do the Right Thing (1989)
19. Casino Royale (2006)
23. Memento (2001)
24. A Room With a View (1986)
32. Fight Club (1999)
33. The Breakfast Club (1985)
34. Fargo (1996)
44. The Player (1992)
77. Sid and Nancy (1986)
91. Back to the Future (1985)

From the TV list:

1. The Simpsons, Fox, 1989-present
2 The Sopranos, HBO (1999-2007)
3 Seinfeld, NBC (1989-98)
5 Sex and the City, HBO (1998-2004)
6 Survivor, CBS (2000-present)
12 South Park, Comedy Central (1997-present)
14 The Daily Show, Comedy Central (1996-present)
17 The Office (U.K. version), BBC2 (2001-03)
18 American Idol, Fox (2002-present)
21 Roseanne, ABC (1988-97)
22 The Real World, MTV (1992-present)
28 The Larry Sanders Show, HBO (1992-98)
30 Late Show With David Letterman, CBS (1993-present)
38 Beavis and Butt-head, MTV (1993-97)
39 Six Feet Under, HBO (2001-05)
43 Late Night With Conan O'Brien, NBC (1993-present)
45 Curb Your Enthusiasm, HBO (2000-present)
49 Twin Peaks, ABC (1990-91)
55. Pee-wee's Playhouse, CBS (1986-90)
63. Mystery Science Theater 3000, Comedy Central (1989-96), Sci Fi (1997-99)
64. The Osbournes, MTV (2002-05)
69. The Colbert Report, Comedy Central (2005-present)
75. Project Runway, Bravo (2004-present)
79. The Comeback, HBO (2005)
83. Absolutely Fabulous, BBC2 (1992), BBC1 (1994-2004)

From the book list:

4. The Liars' Club, Mary Karr (1995)
5. American Pastoral, Philip Roth (1997)
7. Maus, Art Spiegelman (1986/1991)
11. Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer (1997)
28. Naked, David Sedaris (1997)
33. The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion (2005)
66. A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, David Foster Wallace (1997)
72. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Mark Haddon (2003)

(The book list is heavily weighted toward fiction.)

From the style list:

1. Madonna at the MTV Video Music Awards (1984)
2. Sarah Jessica Parker in the opening credits of Sex and the City (1998)
3. Michael Jackson in the ''Thriller'' video (1983)
4. Sharon Stone at the Oscars (1996)
5. Kurt Cobain and grunge style (1991)
7. Amy Winehouse's frocks, bold bras, and sky-high bouffant (2007)
13. Tom Cruise's Ray-Bans and tighty whities in Risky Business (1983)
16. Courtney Love's vintage slip dresses, Mary Janes, and home-grown dye jobs (1995)
17. The leather trenches and Neo-style shades in The Matrix (1999)
48. The goth look of Robert Smith and the Cure (1987)

From the tech list:

3. TiVo (1999)
4. iPod (2001)
5. YouTube (2005)
7. Digital Video Cameras for Consumers (1995)
9. Satellite-Radio Stations (2001)

From the video games:

1. Tetris (1985)

Ha ha. Sorry, I'm old!

From the stage list:

21. Hedwig and the Angry Inch (1998)

Sorry, I've seen a lot of these — the most expensive of these cultural pleasures — and didn't like them very much.

Romantic gestures (these aren't numbered for some reason):

• John Cusack blasts Peter Gabriel outside Ione Skye's window in 1989's Say Anything...
• Ewan McGregor breaks into ''Your Song'' while wooing Nicole Kidman in 2001's Moulin Rouge (2001).
• After her beloved Pedro (Marco Leonardi) dies making love to her in Like Water for Chocolate, Tita (Lumi Cavazos) eats matches, literally igniting her inner flame and burning her whole ranch to the ground.

Movie posters (pictured here):

The Devil Wears Prada
The 40 Year-Old Virgin
Jungle Fever
The Silence of the Lambs

Death scenes:

• Steve Buscemi + a woodchipper + the pure white snow of 1996's Fargo = arguably the most hilarious ooky death on film.
• Mel Gibson, sans intestines, bellows ''Freeeeedommmmmm!'' in Braveheart (1995).
• Warring exes Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner fall to their doom on a chandelier in 1989's The War of the Roses.
• Jack telling Rose not to say her goodbyes before freezing to death in Titanic (1997).
• Lucy Liu losing her head to Uma Thurman's blade in Kill Bill Vol. One (2003).

More lists at the link, but I'll stop here.

Are you watching HBO's "John Adams"?

Beldar is:

He's shown as a gentleman farmer who can relish teaching young John Quincy the utter necessity and joy of going elbow-deep while hand-mixing the contents of the manure-cart, and yet who immediately thereafter, upon hearing the boy's stated desire to become a farmer, firmly announces that it's to be the schoolbooks and "then the law" for the lad. (Some of you will see this — manure-spreading and lawyering — as entirely uncontradictory, just not in the same way Adams himself would have.)

It's a long slog through these episodes, even as the big events of American history pop up with regularity. Just when you think it's dull — let's palpate poop and pontificate — suddenly there's a famous battle right at their doorstep. Or there's John (Paul Giamatti) hunched over his extremely slow-walking horse, and around the next corner is the Boston Massacre. Watch men sweat and bore each other with tedious orations in the candlelight and — hold on — they'll get around to signing the Declaration of Independence. Then HBO will require you to gaze into the earnest, profound, somber visage of Paul Giamatti for several minutes to make sure you don't forget to think, think, think about what it all means. So it is overbearingly serious, but I can take it. If those little kids could put up with having the juice of a dying man's smallpox pustule jabbed into their arms, I can put up with the televised longueurs. Good will come of all this, one hopes.

Maybe you read David McCullough's book. I did not. I subjected myself to his "Truman," and I did not want to read another tome stuffed with way too many pages depicting what a good relationship some great man had with his wife. (Are McCullough's books the opiate of the married?) But I trust HBO, so I'm watching the mini-series. Still, every time I see tableaux of Paul Giamatti and Laura Linney (John and Abigail) smiling wanly, heads tilted together, fingers entwined — there are many! — I confirm my decision to skip that book. (But the Anchoress loved it.)

Let's look for commentary.

Lawprof Rick Garnett:

There were more than enough stirring "rule of law" and "importance of zealous counsel for the accused" moments [in episode 1] to justify recommending the episode to first-year law students. The episode ended with a dramatic speech on "liberty" by Adams (in a church), and with his departure for (I gather) the First Continental Congress. So far, the show seems to be doing a good job of highlighting Adams's struggle to keep-in-balance his "conservative" (that is, his unease-with-revolution) instincts with his "liberty" commitments.

Garnett seems intent on staying in character as a "prawfsblawger." (He's a law professor and he blogs about law — even if he's watching television.)

Paul Silver "swelled with pride and awe at the courage, tenacity, inspiration and skill of our founding parents." Is it okay for us to feel pride at what they did? I kept thinking that we never go to such trouble for anything today. I was feeling more ashamed, thinking I — and maybe everyone I know — would be on the side of the argument that said the war was a foolish risk and we need to bear with things a lot longer and hope for the best from the king. (By the way, didn't you think of Jeremiah Wright when someone said "God save the King" and one of the patriots responded "God damn the King"?)

The Television Without Pity discussion is good and irreverent, as usual:

Mmm, juicy pustules! (Imagine convincing people it was a good thing--especially when they were barely past believing in witchcraft.) I found it pretty dry, and I admit I was doing the Sunday bill-paying, work prep routine so wasn't wholly focused. But Tom Wilkinson was wonderful (although seemed tall for Ben Franklin, I don't know why). The Declaration reading sequence was pretty darn great, realistic or not, though. Sad but not surprising that the founding of Our Great Republic was so beset with bureaucracy and tit-for-tat....

[Tom] Wilkinson was rather good - I was worried about the scenery chewing, but then [Ben] Franklin was probably a smart alecky scenery chewer in real life so the acting fits. I'm neither here nor there on the fake nose, but [David] Morse [as George Washington] is doing rather well also.... One of my favorite scenes was after the vote to declare independence with the room so quiet - the collective thought of "what the hell did we just do? Yeah we really are doing this" just hanging in the air.

Ha ha. Well put. TWoP is such a refreshing read. There really is way too much pity everywhere else.

Oh, I forgot to check mainstream media. Well, here's Tom Shales for the Washington Post

Dramatizing America's colonial and revolutionary years is full of pitfalls and has resulted in many a leaden movie -- from the cartoon buffoons of the musical "1776" to the British-as-mad-fiends hysteria of Mel Gibson's imbecilic "The Patriot." Mythic historical figures can come across as strutting, one-dimensional impersonations. But shrewdly adapting a book by the dedicated David McCullough, writer Kirk Ellis and director Tom Hooper have created characters who live and breathe and also, on occasion, bleed. They talk in complete sentences -- a charming habit long since abandoned here in the Colonies -- and yet the dialogue never seems stiff and unwieldy, as often happens in historical productions.

And here's Alessandra Stanley for the NYT:

[I]n this historical drama, Mr. Giamatti is a prisoner of a limited range and rubbery, cuddly looks — in 18th-century britches and wigs, he looks like Shrek.

And that leaves the mini-series with a gaping hole at its center. What should be an exhilarating, absorbing ride across history alongside one of the least understood and most intriguing leaders of the American Revolution is instead a struggle....

This series has a “Masterpiece Theater” gravity and takes a more somber, detailed and sepia-tinted look at the dawn of American democracy. It gives viewers a vivid sense of the isolation and physical hardships of the period, as well as the mores, but it does not offer significantly different or deeper insights into the personalities of the men — and at least one woman — who worked so hard for liberty.

"I've dished it out for a long time and now it's my time to take it. That's fine. Bring it on."

Drudge is collecting things Imus is saying on the radio today about his predicament.

And here's a summary of what Howard Stern has said about it:

Artie said that when you've been on the air for that long, you should have the ability to argue that he's been on the air for 40 years and he's really not a racist. Imus doesn't even have that as an excuse. Howard said that he could never think in his mind that those girls on the basketball team are ''nappy headed hos'' like Imus called them. He said Imus really screwed up by wearing that cowboy hat that he's been wearing for years now. That gives people a warning that he's a redneck.

It's annoying to read summaries of the Howard Stern show! You have to hear it. But anyway, I think Howard was making an argument like one I made about Mel Gibson's anti-Semitic comments. Mel was drunk, and some people said that meant we should brush off what he said. But my position was that the ideas have to be in your head. Drink lowers you inhibitions, so that things flow out that you held back when you had your sober caution intact.

Now, Imus wasn't drunk, but he was doing ad lib comedy. How can you do that but to let go of the inhibitions that allow ordinary people to function in social situations? He's got to take that risk to give a comic performance. But what comes out must in some way be in there. He's funny -- when he is -- because he's got a mix of interesting things in his head, some of which are the bad and unkind thoughts that may make us laugh because they are things that we hold in too.

We are all flawed, and we do need our comedians. We should talk back and express outrage about some things, but when is the censuring too much? How long must a man abase himself and apologize? How much do we want to see a man grovel?

Here's Amba:

Does anyone catch a smell of human sacrifice?

And whose sins has Don Imus been chosen to die for? What is going on here? The reaction seems so disproportionate to the offense...

I mean... go read this and then come back and tell me Imus is a capital offender. He's just a jerk! He should apologize and make amends to those basketball gazelles, sure, but why is he, of his whole populous class of offenders, getting his throat cut on the altar? And Jesse Jackson getting all high and mighty about it, that's funny!

The selective sanctimony of our society is stupefying....

[T]he thing that maybe freaked me out about it the most: I heard someone, I think Tucker Carlson, say solemnly, in almost hushed tones, "Barack Obama said he should be fired," as if that had been the deciding factor, the nod that dropped the blade. Who is Barack Obama all of a sudden? God? King Solomon? Emperor Nero?

Racism and sanctimony. Is there some way to get them to stop feeding off each other?

"Apocalypto" is not "Aguirre."

From the NYT review of Mel Gibson's "Apocalypto":

When I first heard about this project, and later when I saw the early trailers, I halfway hoped that Mr. Gibson might turn out to be an American (or half-Australian) version of Werner Herzog, setting out into the jungle to explore the dark and tangled regions of human nature. Once you get past the costumes and the subtitles, though, the most striking thing about “Apocalypto” is how comfortably it sits within the conventions of mainstream moviemaking. It is not an obsessive opera like Mr. Herzog’s “Aguirre: The Wrath of God,” but rather a pop period epic in the manner of “Gladiator” or “Braveheart,” and as such less interested in historical or cultural authenticity than in imposing an accessible scheme on a faraway time and place.

"Aguirre: The Wrath of God" is on my very short list of favorite movies. (See my profile.) That "Aguirre" even gets mentioned in the review makes me more likely to partake of the new Mel-o-drama, even if the mention is only to say it's not quite like it.

"Gibson is a primitive all right, but so were Cecil B. DeMille and D. W. Griffith, and somehow we survived their idiocies."

Can we respect the art and put to the side what we know about the artist?

If "Apocalypto" is a great work of art, I want Mel Gibson to get full credit for it. Am I taking back what I said last summer, in a post titled Mel Gibson, you are discredited forever"? Not really. The point there was that what we know about the artist's mind belongs in our interpretation of his work. For that reason, what we learned about him had a very damaging effect on the meaning "The Passion of the Christ," which had already aroused suspicions of anti-Semitism.

What of Richard Schickel's idea of regarding Gibson as a "primitive"? Is this a label that works? Regard the man as an unruly beast who can't meet our normal social standards, and realize that art can spring forth from such a beast and that this art can be fresher and truer that what comes from artists with far greater character and refinement?

IN THE COMMENTS: Johnstodderinexile:

I sense that the Michael Richards incident has retroactively given Mel Gibson another chance....

I agree!

The George Allen "Macaca" story.

This is quite bizarre. I've never followed Senator Allen, and I had absolutely no opinion of him before today, but now we have this story that he singled out a man of Indian descent and called him "macaca," a term I've never seen before.

Allen, who is positioning himself for a possible run for president in 2008, said the name was "just made up" and that he had no idea that macaca is a genus of monkeys including macaques. The name also could be spelled Makaka, which is a city in South Africa.

What sense does that make? Why would you single someone out and make up a term?

"This fellow over here with the yellow shirt -- Macaca or whatever his name is -- he's with my opponent," Allen said. "He's following us around everywhere."

After mentioning that Webb was in California on a fundraising trip, Allen exhorted the crowd: "Let's give a welcome to Macaca here. Welcome to America and the real world of Virginia."

The mere fact that he looked at a dark-skinned man and said "Welcome to America and the real world of Virginia" is repugnant. And it turns out that "macaca" is an offensive racial term. It's hard to believe that's mere chance taken in conjunction with the "Welcome to America" stupidity.

Allen has been accused of racial insensitivity before. He wore a Confederate flag pin in his high school yearbook photo, used to keep a Confederate flag in his living room, a noose in his law office and a picture of Confederate troops in his governor's office, but has said he has grown since then.

I'm sure some commenters will try to talk me down from this conclusion, and I will give your arguments a respectful listen, but, honestly, I think Allen is toast.

DailyKos assembles some impressive evidence about the repulsiveness of this term. And here's Josh Marshall:

We now know that not only is 'macaque' a French language slur used to describe North Africans but Allen has a dizzyingly direct way of being familiar with the word. His mother is French Tunisian. Given that it would be amongst the French colonial population in North Africa that the word would have the greatest currency (even if only by familiarity rather than use), it seems close to impossible to believe that Allen didn't become familiar with the word growing up....

[A]ll sorts of things come out of your mouth when you're speaking extemporaneously. Ask anyone who's spent much time on TV or radio. Not things that weren't in your mind somewhere to say, but some things you might have thought better of if you had a few moments to consider it. If you're not a racist, in most cases racial slurs don't come pouring out or, like one conservative yacker, fantasies about sterilizing African-Americans.

I suspect that Allen started off with a pretty crude effort to make fun of Sidarth as an immigrant, an outsider, perhaps by snidely but in his mind jocularly mispronouncing his name. Who knows? But in the moment, when he was looking at this kid who was clearly getting on his nerves, and amongst a lilly [sic] white crowd, this is the word that came to his mind and he used it.

This is all quite reminiscent of the discussion we just had about Mel Gibson. Except Allen wasn't drunk and Allen is asking us to trust him to be President. My trust is shot to hell.

UPDATE: Here's the video clip of Allen's remarks. He's very jovial and energized, and he slips "macaca" in so smoothly, as if outsiders won't even notice this strange word, camouflaged, as it is, in the happy talk. It seems to signal to insiders in code.

Bloggingheads!

Hey, I'm on Bloggingheads (with Bob Wright)!

ADDED: They're calling it the "Special Gender Difference Edition." You'll have to watch it to ascertain whether that's apt. The topics -- which you can jump to individually within the hour-long show -- are:

Ann's crackpot colleague and the 9/11 `conspiracy' (11:12 minutes)

Mel Gibson, Take 2 (10:07)

How to tell a male blog from a female blog (09:49)

America's polygamy problem (11:07)

Bob dances on Lieberman's grave (04:28)

Ann proves manlier than Bob (07:38)

Anyway, it was great fun get to go on Bloggingheads, which is a show I was already a fan of, and really cool to talk to Robert Wright, whose book "Moral Animal" played a central role in something having to do with me and feminism that happened back in the 90s and that I bring up, to Bob's surprise, in the third segment.

"I am in the process of understanding where those vicious words came from..."

Said Mel Gibson, in the process of apologizing and in the process of creating a mystery about where words that obviously came from his brain came from. But many Mel defenders are repeating the talking point that it's not true that in vino veritas. So let's ask the experts:

When asked where those vicious words came from, Dr. Kevin J. Corcoran, a psychology researcher who has studied the effects of alcohol on perception and judgment, replied, simply, “his mouth.”

Dr. Corcoran said comments do not spring from nothing; for example, Dr. Corcoran said, he himself would not make anti-Semitic statements under the influence of alcohol.

“I say other outrageous things when I’m drunk,” he said.

He added that Mr. Gibson “may not fully believe” his statements about Jews, “but they were waiting to be delivered,” once his inhibitions were lowered and he was subjected to the stress of being pulled over by the police....

[There is] a condition that researchers call the “alcohol myopia effect,” in which someone who has had too much to drink reacts to immediate cues without regard to consequences or the broader social context. G. Alan Marlatt, director of the Addictive Behaviors Research Center at the University of Washington, said that psychologists often focus on the difference between “traits and states.” Inebriation is a temporary state, but it might unleash one’s deeper and more permanent traits, he said.

ADDED: John points out a Flemish proverb: "What is said when drunk has been thought out beforehand." (Found on page 67 of one of our favorite books, W.H. Auden and Louis Kronenberger's "Aphorisms.")

MORE: I see there's a painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elder called "The Flemish Proverbs." Look closely. See if you can find Mel Gibson.

Leaving Teton Village.

Time to hit the road again, checking out of the posh hotel I will now identify: the Jackson Hole Four Seasons. (Hey, it's 35° here!)

I'll drive most of the day, positioning myself for a quick tour of one last national park before driving the rest of the way home tomorrow. Enough driving already. The mental picture of home has gotten achingly clear.

Feel free to use the comments section here as an amiable coffeehouse. An amiable coffeehouse where everyone's obsessed with Mel Gibson. No, really, give it a rest. Surely, there are lots of other things to talk about, from light -- Is Heath Ledger a good Joker? -- to heavy -- Is Israel winning?

UPDATE: I'm still laughing about something Bissage wrote in the comments: "'the Jackson Hole Four Seasons.' Isn't that, like, you know, three different music groups?" Sippican adds:



Anyway, I'm pining for the Four Seasons, as I've reached today's destination, the worst of the four Holiday Inn Express motels I chose for stepping stones on the way to my two posh hotels. I picked Holiday Inn Express because of the clarity of their internet access promise. I was going to give the brand the Althouse seal of approval, but this last one had a busted ethernet wall jack (and a broken telephone), and when I went down to the lobby to say I needed another room, the desk clerk did not take me seriously -- he sniggered at my problem! He also asserted that there were no extra rooms, but obviously, since I'm posting, there was another room. I won't recount the hassle I went through after a long day's drive, but all I'll say is: Holiday Inn, protect your brand! Two of your motels were first rate. One was very slightly off. But this fourth is rather sleazy.

And I just wanted to add that I've seen all the "Batman" movies. And I watched the TV show when it was originally on and a big craze.

Mel Gibson, you are discredited forever.

Everything you ever did is now tainted.

"Freedom!" It has no meaning anymore.

What artist has ever crashed like this? Not Michael Jackson. Not Woody Allen. Not O.J. Simpson. You've shown an evil heart and it changes the meaning of all of your artistic work. How horrible! How painful! Try to imagine the penance you must do.

Aye, fight and you may die, run, and you'll live... at least for a while. And dying in your beds, many years from now, would you be willin' to trade ALL the days, from this day to that, for one chance, just one chance, to come back here and tell our enemies that they may take our lives, but they'll never take... OUR FREEDOM!

So sad to think of the Mel Gibson I thought existed.

IN THE COMMENTS: A lot of people are defending Gibson and complaining that people are criticizing him because he's considered right wing. I note that doesn't explain my position, which has nothing to do with his politics, whatever they're supposed to be. I concede that my comment about O.J. Simpson is extreme (and that Simpson isn't an artist, though it would be easy to make up some sports-talk bullshit declaring his athleticism artistic). My point is that what Simpson (presumably) did doesn't change the meaning of the achievements that made him a big star. Gibson, on the other hand, has revealed something loathsome about his mind that affects our interpretation of the works of art that sprang from that mind. In particular, it changes "The Passion of the Christ," which had to be defended at the time of its release from charges that it is anti-Semitic.

UPDATE: Details on the aftermath of Mel's meltdown. I note the restaurant where he'd been drinking is called Moonshadows. Do we really need to think about Cat Stevens here? Oh, if I ever lose my reputation, oh if.... I won't have to work in Hollywood no more.

"Attention! We are all dying here! We are all dying!"

Mel Gibson shouts through a bullhorn. He's directing "Apocalypto":

Hundreds of local extras—many of whom have never seen a movie, let alone acted in one—are pounding fake limestone to build a temple used for human sacrifices....

[I]f there are complaints about Apocalypto's portrayal of human sacrifice by the Maya, whose mostly impoverished descendants today are a cause célèbre for liberals, Gibson says he won't care. "After what I experienced with The Passion, I frankly don't give a flying f___ about much of what those critics think."...

"The parallels between the environmental imbalance and corruption of values that doomed the Maya and what's happening to our own civilization are eerie," says Safinia. Gibson, who insists ideology matters less to him than stories of "penitential hardship" like his Oscar-winning Braveheart, puts it more bluntly: "The fearmongering we depict in this film reminds me a little of President Bush and his guys."

He's a man with his own vision, and he doesn't give a flying f___ what you think. And the vision, apparently, isn't right-wing politics, it's penitential hardship. Always a great subject for art.

Simulblogging the Screen Actors Guild Awards.

7:05 (Central Time): Glenn Close wins for TV Movie Actress, beating, among others, Charlize Theron, who looks really cool in slick black hair. Close gasps about how daunting it was to do a role made "iconic" by Katharine Hepburn (in "Lion in Winter"). In the tradition of Screen Actors Guild Awards, Close speaks in terms of acting as a field of labor. Close is wearing a yellow, spaghetti-strapped gown, and her upper chest glistens with sweat. You can see her freckles. I've always had freckles, so I'm always pleased to see the freckles shining through a beautiful person's makeup. In the preshow, I could see that Jamie Foxx has freckles.



7:10: Now, for the TV Movie Actor. Geoffrey Rush (and not the freckle-faced Jamie Foxx) wins. Rush fondles the little naked man that is the statuette and says he deludes himself into thinking that when he's naked he looks like that little guy.



7:18: Jamie Foxx is the next presenter, and the teleprompter malfunctions (or he does). He comically calls for a do-over, and screws up again, and has to comically call for another do-over. He introduces the clip from "Ray." I haven't seen the movie, but is it all about how he cheats on his wife? Who needs to see that? The next award is for movie supporting actress. Based on the clips, I'm for Laura Linney. Cate Blanchett wins, creating the second opportunity of the night to talk about Katharine Hepburn (the character she plays in "The Aviator"). She talks about freckles! She thanks the makeup artist who painted every freckle on her face. Katharine Hepburn was another freckle-face. Freckles! It's a night in celebration of freckles! Now, there's a cool tribute to stunt people and puppeteers and voiceover artists and extras and dancers. They count as actors too in the Guild's way of structuring things. "Extras," in this way of thinking about things, are called "background actors."



7:33: Male actor in a comedy TV series is the next award. I don't watch any of these shows, so I don't care. Tony Shaloub wins. Sandra Oh is one of the presenters of the next award, and I love the way she looks and her green dress. The award is for actress in a TV series, and here I do know one of the shows: "Sex and the City." So maybe I hope Sarah Jessica Parker wins. But what do I know? Teri Hatcher wins. Sandra Oh, by the way, is in "Sideways," which I haven't seen, because when I went to go see it, I crashed my car and didn't make it. Teri Hatcher is wearing a weird, breast-smooshing black dress. Like most of the actresses, she's wearing extra-long dangly earrings. Paul Giamatti comes out to introduce the clip of "Sideways," and he gets a ton of applause, presumably because he got passed over for the Oscar. Now: Ellen Degeneres, giving the comedy series ensemble award. I love the ensemble awards. She tells some jokes and is pretty cute. "Arrested Development" and "Desperate Housewives" look great in the clips. "Desperate Housewives" wins. The women are all sheathed in such tight dresses that they have trouble walking to the stage. The guy that makes the speech -- some producer or whatever -- uses the opportunity to denounce reality TV, which he's "ringing the death knell" of -- a cause dear to the people in the room.



7:52: Mel Gibson comes out and does a bad job of reading the teleprompter. He's giving a lifetime achievement award to James Garner. Shots of Garner in the audience show him giving what looks to me like the stinkeye to Gibson. "Such low level crap they're celebrating," I say as they show the Garner clip show. He just doesn't seem to be an important enough actor to be getting this treatment. To his credit, he doesn't seem at all egotistical. He talks of doing his best. And you have to admit, he was a very handsome man when he was young. Oh, this is going on WAY too long. We're eight minutes into this! Garner comes up and says he's "umbled" to receive an award. Now, we're eleven minutes into it. This is insane! He's touched deep in his heart. Can you believe it? He loves his wife! "Actors are very special people." Can't go wrong with that in this room, but you people are on television. Finally, after thirteen minutes, the segment is over. Unbelievable!



8:08: Melissa Gilbert, president of the Guild, comes out to say some general things. She's wearing a pink dress, inflated breasts, and what looks like a boa of giant black ashes slung over her shoulder. Next is Don Cheadle, introducing the "Hotel Rwanda" clip. Now: Kate Winslet -- a big favorite chez Althouse. She's wearing a tight light blue satin dress. The clips are for movie supporting actor. The clip for Thomas Hayden Church has him saying "asshole" totally unbleeped. (The show is on "E!") [CORRECTION: The show was on TNT.] Morgan Freeman wins. The crowd goes wild! Standing ovation! The actors love this guy. He sings the "Maverick" theme song, because, I guess, the tribute to James Garner just did not go on long enough. Freeman thanks everybody on the face of the earth. Laura Linney comes out in a horrible blackish dress. She introduces the memorial to dead actors segment. First: Ronald Reagan! Big cheer for Rodney Dangerfield. Also for Ossie Davie, who died a couple days ago. Also for Jerry Orbach, Ray Charles, Christopher Reeve, and Johnny Carson. Surprisingly not so much for the greatest actor who died this past year: Marlon Brando.



8:25: Actress in a TV drama. They all look great. Jennifer Garner -- who seems pretty surprised -- wins. She's got a cool silvery dress. The small-breasted women are looking especially good in their dresses tonight. I hope that will be the new style. I'm quite tired of the balloony look. Actor in a TV drama. A chair thrown through a window is featured more than the actor in one of the clips. The dead man, Jerry Orbach, wins. His wife accepts, and she runs up to the stage. "How bittersweet, but it's still sweet." Clint Eastwood comes out to introduce the clip of his own movie, "Million Dollar Baby," which he briefly forgets the name of. Glenn Close introduces the award for TV drama series ensemble. I only watch "Six Feet Under" and "The Sopranos." "CSI" wins, which bores me. But, again, what do I know? I don't watch that show. The clip looked dumb.



8:42: It's the beautiful Johnny Depp! He's introducing the best actress award. It's between Kate and Hilary. Depp is all in black: black suit, shirt, and tie. He must want Kate, who starred with him in "Finding Neverland." (Kate's nomination is for "Eternal Sunshine.") Hilary Swank wins. Depp darts away -- the man is so shy. I'm glad to see Swank win, because I think she doesn't get so many roles, which I think is, frankly, because she is not as good looking as the main actresses who get the roles she ought to get. When she's gotten a great script, she's been great. Her mom's there. She thanks everyone. Leonardo Dicaprio and Cate Blanchett come out to introduce the clip from "The Aviator." Charlize Theron is next -- sporting the excellent new tiny breasts look. She's a bit late coming out, and she runs to catch up. The award is best actor in a movie. The award goes to the gloriously freckle-faced Jamie Foxx.



8:58: Chris just emailed me this link, showing that Charlize Theron is making a movie about the landmark sexual harassment case, Jenson vs. Eveleth Mines. The final award is announced, for movie ensemble: it's "Sideways." Another chance to see Sandra Oh's fabulous green dress. She does the speech too. "This has been such a pure filmmaking experience." Ah, her green dress and my green car, the greenness of destiny! I like that they are having Oh speak, because she's the only one of the four actors who did not get singled out for any nominations. Tim Robbins romps out to say, "Good night, everybody!" And that's the show! End of post! It's been a great privilege, simulblogging for you this evening!



UPDATE: A next-day realization.