"When you get divorced, all the truths that come out, you sit there and you go, 'What the f*** was I doing?'"

"'What was I doing believing that this person was invested in this way?' Which is a fantastically strong humiliation in the best sense..."

Says Sean Penn, who doesn't "feel that I have ever been loved."

"Some grub with POTUS?" — a subject line on email from the Obama campaign.

"Ann -- You, President Obama, a table, chairs, and some grub," it begins.

Grub! What sort of people think how hard and how long to come up with another way to make a chance at eating dinner with Obama enticing and come up with some grub?

"Want to give it a shot?" I'm asked, with a link to a site where I can contribute to the campaign. There follows this picture:



And I'm told "It'll be pretty awesome." Awesome... grub... It's like suddenly, simultaneously, I'm an air-headed teenager...



... and Wooster from "Wagon Train."

"The film 'Fast Times at Ridgemont High' was released 30 years ago today..."

"... and if there's a better line reading in the history of American cinema than Sean Penn's 'You dick' to Mr. Hand, I don't think I know it."

Says Throwing Things.

The 3 Stooges movie will have the perfect Larry.

Sean Penn!

(Jim Carrey is Curly and Benicio Del Toro is Moe.)

IN THE COMMENTS: Balfegor said:

Why would someone even think a 3 Stooges remake would be a good idea? It would be like remaking something by Buster Keaton, or Charlie Chaplin -- the pleasure isn't in the concept or the plot or witty dialogue, it's in who's doing it, and their skill at slapstick and physical comedy, no?

Well, now, wait. What about this?



The original:

Meryl not Kate. Sean not Mickey.

Surprises in the top acting categories for the Screen Actors Guild Awards tonight.

I loved the way Meryl was all breathless and surprised. "I didn't even buy a dress." And, she assured us, there really is no such thing as the greatest living actress. But, deep down, didn't she know that she is that woman?

The Oscar nominations.

Here.

Observations:

1. Kate Winslet's performance in "The Reader" is classified as a "leading role," and it is her only nomination. She won Golden Globes for "leading" in "Revolutionary Road" and for "supporting" in "The Reader." The Academy is not buying that, and I'd say rightly so. It's a leading role in "The Reader," and I'm tired of big stars getting their roles categorized as supporting to horn in on the lesser actors with smaller parts.

2. "Revolutionary Road" generally seems snubbed. Leonardo DiCaprio didn't get a nomination. (Though Michael Shannon got a supporting nomination.) And there is no Best Picture or Director nomination.

3. I've seen 4 of the Best Picture nominees: "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," "Milk," "The Reader," and "Slumdog Millionaire." I haven't seen "Frost/Nixon," and frankly, I don't want to. I can see in the trailer the way Nixon's own words have been edited and ham-acted into something they were not. I'd give the Oscar to "Slumdog Millionaire." "Milk" would be fine too.

4. Richard Jenkins in "The Visitor"? I know nothing about that one. I guess he must have been good. I'll try to check it out before saying I think Sean Penn or Mickey Rourke should win Best Actor. I think Rourke will win because he suffered so much making that movie.

5. Melissa Leo in "Frozen River"? Again, I know nothing about that one. And I haven't seen Angelina Jolie in "The Changeling." (Oddly, I've never seen Angelina Jolie in anything! I guess I just done share her taste in films.) I guess the plan is to give Best Actress to Kate Winslet. Wonder if there will be a backlash.

6. I've seen all the Supporting Actress films. Personally, I love Penélope Cruz. What an amusing performance!

7. I've seen 3 of the Supporting Actor films. I love Robert Downey Jr., but I haven't seen "Tropic Thunder." (I will.) I saw "Iron Man." And I haven't seen "Revolutionary Road" yet, because it hasn't hit town. I've seen "Milk," "Doubt," and "The Dark Knight," and if it were between those 3, I'd pick Josh Brolin in "Milk." That was one of the most effective performances I've ever seen. And I went into the film not knowing he'd been singled out as especially good, so, for me, he came out of nowhere and killed.

8. I see both Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt got nominated. Congratulations to the happy couple. Life's not fair, but they seem to be decent people making good decisions. No need to hate them.

"Look seans an old friend of mine and i didnt buy his performance at all..."

“... thought he did an average pretend acting like he was gay besides hes one of the most homophobic people i kno"

Mickey Rourke, lusting for the Oscar, texts about Sean Penn.

ADDED: You know, if I wanted to argue that the movie "Milk" is homophobic, I could think of a good 6 points.

"Milk" may be the best movie in all of the following categories:

1. Depiction of the political process. (Other example: "The Candidate.")

2. Blending recreated historical scenes with archival footage of historical events.

3. Recreating the look and feel of the 1970s. (Other example: "Boogie Nights.")

4. Making an implicit and effective argument for a political position.

5. Showing a character's emotions through his reaction to opera. (Other examples: "Moonstruck," "Slumdog Millionaire.")

6. Artistic representation of the moment of death.

7. Artistic representation of assassination.

8. A serious drama that creates surprising empathy for a character who doesn't deserve it and is not the hero of the story. (Josh Brolin was painfully brilliant as Dan White.)

9. Depiction of a formal debate in a political campaign. (The debate with Briggs about Prop 6.)

10. A character tells his story into the microphone of a tape recorder. (Other examples: Philip Baker Hall as Nixon in Robert Altman's "Secret Honor," John Hurt in Atom Egoyan's version of "Krapp's Last Tape.")(Not quite in the category: Ralph Fiennes in "The Reader." It's not in the category because — spoiler — he's reading books, not telling his own story.)

11. Scene reflected in a convex mirror. (The fisheye effect.)

12. Scene shot through a window with reflections on the window.

13. Depicting the importance of whistles. (Here's the competition.)

14. Depiction of political apathy. (The first appearance of Cleve Jones, played by Emile Hirsch, who was Chris McCandless in "Into the Wild.")

15. Use of notes stuck all over the wall to create alarm about a character's mental distress. (Other example: "A Beautiful Mind.")

16. Recitation of (part of) "The Declaration of Independence."

17. Actors looking uncannily like the real-life characters they play.

18. Sean Penn movie.

19. Gus Van Sant movie.

20. Movie released in 2008.

Madonna brainwashes A-Rod with Kabbalah.

She's making him believe they are soulmates. That's what his wife says, according to a friend. Wouldn't it be amazing if God spent his time — I know, God is beyond time, etc., but don't confuse me with that now — pairing up big celebrities?

Okay, Madonna with Sean Penn, that's funny. That's amusing. Now, I'm tired of that. I don't like Sean Penn as Mr. Madonna. Let's put her over here and have her screw Guy Ritchie up for a while. He's been annoying me. He needs some obstacles. Enough of that. That got boring. Wedding with kilts was good, but English estate, children's books, prissing around... blah! Put her with A-Rod now. That'll be hilarious.

Note: I don't really understand Kabbalah or the mind of God. I'm just guessing.

"Mr. Ledger magically and mysteriously disappears beneath the skin of his lean, sinewy character."

"It is a great screen performance, as good as the best of Marlon Brando and Sean Penn."

Dead at 28. Heath Ledger.

IN THE COMMENTS: Pogo writes:

My 15 year old son was quite shaken by this. He loves the movies. We both liked him in the ones already mentioned.

But he was mostly waiting to see him in Batman, feverishly following all the viral teasers the studio has thrown out over the internet....

I don't know what happened to Ledger; we'll hear soon enough. My son had seen a recent interview that suggested something wasn't quite right with Mr. Ledger, all jittery and picking at his arms....

Here's the video. I knew right away what you were talking about because I was looking for a clip to include with the original post. After watching it, I decided it wasn't the tone I was looking for.

"I was moved when Sean came to my defense."

Jude Law reveals the pain and sorrow, how Chris Rock hurt him so much at the Oscars in 2005 when he joked and then just kept joking about how Law was in so many movies these days. Oh, it's such a mercy that there are profoundly humorless souls like Sean Penn to come to the rescue of that poor man.

Maybe we shouldn't have registered all those young people to vote ...

"Team America" premieres and the NYT is disturbed to discover that the "South Park" guys are ... gasp! ... conservative! Reviewer A.O. Scott writes:

The obscene patriotic ditty that is the Team America theme song might be hyperbolic (and impossible to stop singing), but it is not sarcastic. Nor is a speech, delivered twice in the course of the action, most powerfully at the climactic moment, that is meant as an answer both to the Hollywood peaceniks and to the wishy-washy world community, whose representatives have gathered in North Korea for a peace conference.



Because of its graphic (though metaphorical) discussion of human anatomy, I can't quote any of the speech here, but it is one of the more cogent — and, dare I say it, more nuanced — defenses of American military power that I have heard recently.

Scott begins his review by saying we're in "a golden age of satire" (replete with the Times's obligatory praise for Jon Stewart), but he ends the review expressing frustration that he can't find a way to argue against it. But he does try. He says that as a big "South Park" fan he expected "a wholesale demolition of everything pious, hypocritical and dumb in American culture and society," but "Maybe I expected too much." Yes, that's the way I feel every time I watch "The Daily Show." I keep expecting them to satirize both sides. I even expect NYT articles that refer to "The Daily Show"--and there are so many--to admit it falls short because it doesn't attack "everything pious, hypocritical and dumb" in American politics. But maybe I expect too much.



UPDATE: This is interesting, from Entertainment Weekly (subscription needed):

After Parker and Stone received a letter from the Oscar winner [Sean Penn]— in which he condemned them for recent comments in Rolling Stone urging uninformed voters to stay away from the ballot booths — the duo had a laugh at the actor's expense. ''It was like he missed the point,'' says Stone. Adds Parker: ''It's obvious what he's really pissed off about is that we made him into a puppet and had him eaten by a panther [in the movie].... It's hysterical, because nothing could make us happier. It's like, Spicoli's pissed at you. What does he think, we're going to be like, 'Dude, Sean Penn's pissed at us! What should we do?''' One thing they briefly considered doing was taking Penn up on his offer to escort them around Iraq: ''We were going to take him over there and kick his ass,'' laughs Stone.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Llama Butchers laughs at the wishful thinking of the WaPo movie critic, whose cluelessness can be read in the review's subtitle, "'South Park' Creators' Left Jab at Jingoism May Backfire."

Fall movie preview.

The big Fall movie preview issue of Entertainment Weekly arrived in the mail today, and on the cover is my personal favorite actor, Johnny Depp. Not only is he clean shaven now, but he's got his hair combed back quite elegantly and he's wearing a suit. He looks quite like my father in the pencil drawing that I keep on the mantel. I'm having a bit of trouble getting past the cover! Hmm… the cover folds out and there are sixteen small pictures of various Fall movie stars. One of them is Maggie Gyllenhall, who looks uncannily like my own mother as a young girl. Okay, I'm finished with the cover. On to the magazine. Here's what caught my eye:



1. "Seinfeld" is coming out on DVD with "deleted scenes, blooper reels, an alternate version of the pilot, and cast commentaries."



2. Ereka Vetrini, Omarosa's nemesis from "The Apprentice," will be Tony Danza's sidekick on the new "Tony Danza Show." It's a talk show. Yeah, Ereka can talk.



3. Jamie Foxx, playing the role of Ray Charles in the biopic "Ray, " "wore prosthetics (modeled on Charles' actual eyes) to simulate the singer's blindness." He asserts that this was needed to avoid "cheating" as he moved around. It would be unaesthetic without prosthetics. But acting is faking it in all sorts of ways. Among the great actors who played blind sans eye prosthetics are: Audrey Hepburn and Bette Davis and Gabrielle Anwar and Patty Duke and Virginia Cherrill. The movies seem to prefer blind women to blind men, but I note the great Mr. Muckle in my all-time favorite comedy "It's a Gift." And the guy in "Butterflies Are Free." Ah! The best performance by a male actor as a blind character was Al Pacino. Hmm… and there was good old Gabrielle Anwar as his love interest. What has become of of Gabrielle anyway? Oh, and another fine performance by a male as a blind character was Gene Hackman. It seems blind men are funny and blind women are dramatic. You can think about why, and think about whether Foxx's film will be a hit. He sure looks like Ray Charles in the photograph. He's also, according to EW, a fine pianist--he went to college on a piano scholarship. So he'll be doing all the piano playing as Ray. Nice fact to know: Ray Charles, who died in June, was able to witness the final cut of the film.



4. John Travolta and Joaquin Phoenix play firefighters in "Ladder 49," which is supposed to be better than "Backdraft," which real firefighters hate (because it's unrealistic). The filmmakers want you to think "Black Hawk Down."



5. They remade "Alfie," with Jude Law as Michael Caine. I've never bothered to watch the Michael Caine one, so why should I care? Well, Law is much cuter than Caine.



6. So what's the Christian Bale diet? "I just didn't eat." He got down to 120 pounds (he's 6'2"). He also only slept 2 hours a night. What role required all that? Some paranoid guy in "The Machinist." He's bulked back up for "Batman."



7. New Alexander Payne movie. "Sideways." I loved "Election" and "After Schmidt" was pretty good. Good lord, this new film is set in a wine-tasting milieu!



8. "The Grudge"—they've hired the director of the original Japanese film ("Ju-on") to do the Hollywood version. Takashi Shimizu. It stars Sarah Michelle Gellar, who looks just like Gwyneth Paltrow in this picture.



9. Johnny Depp and Kate Winslet together at last! "Finding Neverland." A biopic of J.M. Barrie. I hope it's good, because this is one I'd like to see.



10. Kevin Spacey directs himself in a biopic of Bobby Darin. "Beyond the Sea." How could that possibly be good? Spacey is eight years older than Darin was when he died. And who is interested in the life of Bobby Darin? That's just crazy! It seems the only reason for this is that Spacey has always looked a bit like Bobby Darin. What's next for Kevin? A biopic of Lee Harvey Oswald?



11. It's biopic year for the Oscar-craving actors as Leonardo DiCaprio plays Howard Hughes (with Martin Scorsese directing) in "The Aviator." There really is some fascination in seeing Cate Blanchett impersonate Katharine Hepburn and Kate Beckinsale impersonate Ava Gardner.



12. Jim Carey as Lemony Snickett. He rides a Segway. Okay.



13. "Proof," "Closer" … I guess I'm supposed to care about these Oscar-y productions. I'll wait for the reviews. And even if they are good, I'll probably resist, because I still remember getting hoodwinked into seeing "The Hours." Prestige movies for women: leave me alone!



14. Then there's the question: What Don Cheadle movies can I see in December? There's "Hotel Rwanda," in which Cheadle plays the role of Paul Rusesabagina, who saved the lives of 1200 Tutsis in 1994 (a great story). And there's "The Assassination of Richard Nixon," a political thriller that also stars Sean Penn and Naomi Watts.



15. They're making a film of "Get Smart," with perfect casting: Steve Carell.



16. A current film I'd buy right now if it were on DVD: "Los Angeles Plays Itself." It's a documentary about L.A. as it appears in the movies.



17. Ah! Finally, a decent DVD of "Purple Rain." Make sure you get the 20th Anniversary version. Don't buy this one.

Blogad woes.

How long must my Blogads continue to refer to a topic I've blogged about in the past but don't want to mention now lest my blog forever bear a heading that makes this look like a one-issue blog? I don't think Blogads has a way to know whether the blogwriter is for or against a particular matter mentioned in the blog. I could just as well be against X as for it! If I were against it, it would be quite offensive and aggravating, but it still bugs me, because it's been there so long. What can I write about that would trigger a new ad? I've mentioned Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews. (I'm using Tonya's technique for communicating with Blogads.) I've mentioned Sean Penn today. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. Sean Penn. And Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. Johnny Depp. And how about that new Tom Cruise movie? I haven't gone to the movies in a while, but I have a lot of respect for Michael Mann, the director of Cruise's new movie "Collateral," which is getting good reviews. And I have a special place in my heart for Tom Cruise, who revealed his inner nerd on the Letterman show last week when he laughed so hard a booger flew out of his nose. (Fun to rewatch on TiVo!) "Collateral" is kind of a boring name for a movie. I remember when I was a teenager, encountering the word "collateral" for the first time and trying very hard to figure out the meaning from the context, which was "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream":

Now, I didn't mean to be nosy

But I went into a bank

To get some bail for Arab

And all the boys back in the tank

They asked me for some collateral

And I pulled down my pants

They threw me in the alley

When up comes this girl from France

Who invited me to her house

I went, but she had a friend

Who knocked me out

And robbed my boots

And I was on the street again

I've always liked Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. Bob Dylan. So now can I please have some different ads, Blogads? Please?



UPDATE: This seems to have worked!

Facial hair.

Check out this picture and this picture of Johnny Depp. What do you think of the facial hair? Better without? It's a raging question around here. Note the detail of his facial hair: the mustache and beard (both skimpy) are not connected.



You might say, well, Johnny Depp is just so pretty that mussing himself up a bit is a good move. So look at Sean Penn, who's using the same disconnected skimpy look. Penn is distinctly not pretty, so looking at him helps judge this facial hair style because we're not influenced by the overall facial beauty.



(I tried to do a blogpoll, but I couldn't get it to work! Any clues? I've got the javascript but Blogger tells me the "tag is not allowed.")



UPDATE: I think, with JF's help, I've found out how to get the blogpoll to work, so now you can vote. (The trick is just to ignore the error message.)

"The 'Performance of Her Career' Is Now an Academy Award Winner." So reads the new, post-Oscars ad for Cold Mountain, which features a photo of Renée Zellweger in her ceremonial swaddling clothes, clutching the little statue. I was going to criticize the writing: in trying to use that quote, "performance of her career," they ended up having the wrong subject to the sentence, "performance" instead of "Renée Zellweger."

But the award really is for "Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role." Sean Penn had the line in his thank you speech, "There are no best actors." But there are no Best Actor Oscars. That's just shorthand. The Oscar he held in his hands was for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading role. So to be accurate, the actors ought to say:

"I'm happy to accept this award on behalf of my performance, which is unable to be here tonight and in any event, incapable of holding a statuette."

Hmm... did you know that last year, when Renée Zellweger lost the Oscar... I mean, when her performance lost the Oscar .... she went home early, climbed in through the window, gave her dog a bath, and spent the night scrubbing the floor. Sounds like something Joan Crawford would do.

Oh, and the dog's name is Dylan, so presumably, it's black, it's a pedantic mongrel, it's got his bone in the alley, it licks her face when she sleeps, it's collar's from India, it means more to her than a dead lion, and it's barking and running free.

The dreadful Oscars show. The Oscars show was even duller than the SAG Awards. Was there even a single surprise? Billy Crystal's return reminded me of some of the sad returns Lucille Ball made to TV in her waning years: she was doing the same sorts of things that used to be so funny, but now it just seemed wrong for her to strain herself to do it. Crystal seemed to want to throw out lines about current movie happenings, but how much comic traction can you really get out of "The Passion of the Christ"? Everyone seemed afraid of offending, as if they were all massively overshadowed by Janet Jackson's epic breast. Only Errol Morris said anything with any political sting, and his speech revealed that his true outrage really lay more in the area of the way the Academy has been slighting him all these years. (Of course, he was right about that, but it wasn't all that lovely for him to be the one saying it.) Tim Robbins restricted his politics to concern about child abuse, and Sean Penn only made an oblique reference to WMD. Nearly everyone just thanked people endlessly, tediously. Then more time had to be wasted, lamely, by having Jack Black and Will Ferrell sing about how the thank you speeches are boring. And, oh, the songs, those songs-non-songs that extend the already horrible longueurs of the show's midsection.

I had to read about Sean Penn's statement, because I bailed out before he appeared, somewhere in the show's fourth hour, when I calculated all the awards that had yet to be given, and how long I would need to wait for the big four awards. The show was quite simply torture--impossibility of making "The Passion" quips noted--the least entertaining Oscars show in memory. I enjoyed some of the early red carpet stuff: Jennifer Garner had a lovely tangerine dress and Renee Zellweger looked painfully swaddled in white cardboardish cloth. But it was pretty much downhill from there.