Tag: Russell Crowe

Thor: Love and Thunder (2022, Taika Waititi)

Thor: Love and Thunder ends like all Thor movies, promising the next one will—finally—deliver on the promise. The first movie follow-up fumbled when co-star Natalie Portman didn’t rate an Avengers 1 gig, the second movie when Portman didn’t rate an Avengers 2 gig, the third movie had Avengers 3 entirely upend it (with Portman not bothering coming back). Well, she’s back for Love and Thunder and given how she’s got such a lousy arc, it won’t be a surprise if she’s gone for good this time.

Of course, they didn’t stop messing with Chris Hemsworth’s character arc—which now apparently wraps back around to the first movie, only not really—with the latest Avengers. The most recent one sent Hemsworth off with The Guardians of the Galaxy, who barely show up in Love and Thunder. Chris Pratt gets the most lines, but the others seem like they showed up for a couple hours, plus and minus the makeup chair. They’re just around long enough for Hemsworth to head back to Earth, having found himself between Avengers 4 and this one.

Only not really, because when he gets back to Earth, he discovers Portman has the power of Thor. She’s been superheroing it up on Earth; only we don’t see any of it. Once Hemsworth’s back in the movie, Portman’s downgraded to a girlfriend part. Worse, she’s demoted to an ex-girlfriend whose emotional experience isn’t part of the story. And their reuniting arc is all about them getting back together.

Shame she’s only Thor because Hemsworth made his old hammer promise to look after her, which includes after it got broken in Thor 3 and Portman ingloriously got cancer at the beginning of this movie. It’s got to be really hard on the character, whose single bit of character development—besides Kat Dennings coming back for a cameo—is flashbacks to the character’s mom dying of cancer. It doesn’t even rise to middling soap opera; Love and Thunder could give a shit about Portman.

To be entirely fair, it’s unclear what Love and Thunder does give a shit about. Special guest star villain Christian Bale, who starts the movie in an apparent homage to the beginning of Star Trek V, which is a flex, is potentially compelling, but once the film spends any time with him, it’s clear he’s… just as dangerous as Josh Brolin in the Avengers movies. So, why doesn’t Bale get a fourteen-movie arc or whatever.

The film’s very wishy-washy on the Marvel movies’ gods—with Russell Crowe showing up for a Zeus cameo (leading to the film’s most successful moment, as long as you stick around long enough)—but they don’t do jack shit for their worshippers. They like it that way just fine, thank you very much. Bale’s mad his daughter died in a desert while his god had an oasis nearby and didn’t intercede.

Conveniently, Bale then finds the power to kill all the gods in the universe, pretty quickly going after Tessa Thompson and the Asgardians living on Earth. Specifically their children. He kidnaps their children and puts them in a spider cage on an asteroid in a black and white universe.

Kieron L. Dyer plays the lead kid, son of now-dead Idris Elba, who can communicate across the universe with Hemsworth. Given where Love and Thunder ends up, there ought to be an arc for Dyer and Hemsworth. There’s not. There’s barely an arc for Hemsworth and Portman.

Actually, given the end of the movie, it seems like Dyer could’ve been the film’s protagonist or at least jockeying for the spot. He doesn’t. Despite Love and Thunder having a Guns N’ Roses-heavy soundtrack and Dyer being a new, enthusiastic Guns N’ Roses fan, the two things are unconnected.

Director Waititi narrates the film in his role as Hemsworth’s CGI sidekick. The film’s more successful in summary than in scene, which isn’t great.

There are some iffy effects throughout—Waititi’s got these vaguely boring intergalactic settings (not sure who thought black and white universe was the way to go with an outer space fight)—but the finale’s got some fantastic visualizing of a tough Marvel Comics character to visualize realistically.

They get away with it, on Portman and Bale’s professional competency and Hemsworth’s easy charm. And the setup for next time is beyond cloying and trendy; they’ll finally do a great one. Promise.

The Nice Guys (2016, Shane Black)

I recently joked to a friend I wanted to claim “audacity” as a complementary phrase, but just for Stanley Kubrick. Something simple like, “Stanley Kubrick: Audacity can be a compliment.” But then she called me on it being gross.

The Nice Guys is basically, “Shane Black: Humility is for [slur we’re allowed to use because the movie’s set in 1978].” It’s never terrible, though Black’s got his usual “no, but, maybe you’re misogynistic for saying this scene or characterization is misogynist,” which gets exasperating. Especially since it’s in the Boogie Nights riff part of the movie. Nice Guys is a pseudo-noir and mostly a series of lifts from other movies, including ones Black wrote for other directors.

The film’s heroes, The Nice Guys, are soulful bruiser Russell Crowe, who hates his comically evil ex-wife and protects young women from predators, and sad drunk private investigator Ryan Gosling. Except the de facto protagonist of the movie is Angourie Rice, playing Gosling’s daughter. Since she’s a thirteen-year-old in 1978 L.A., tagging along on her dad’s job to porn parties, hunted by vicious hitmen, she’s always in danger, and the audience knows it. Gosling and Crowe forget about it at the drop of a hat, but the film’s always about reminding terrible things could happen to Rice anytime. So when she’s not around, it just means she might be in danger, which focuses the film on her.

Of all the things Black didn’t think to rip off… it’d be a fine “Veronica Mars” riff.

Gosling is bilking client Lois Smith (the film’s most successful cameo but only because the others mostly stink); she’s convinced her pornstar granddaughter is alive, even though the movie showed her dying in the first scene. You know, kind of like Lethal Weapon 1.

He’s actually doing some investigating—which the movie never shows and instead uses as gotchas from Gosling to other characters—and is pretty sure Smith really saw Margaret Qualley. Qualley knows Gosling is after her, so she hires Crowe to beat him up.

Then the actual bad guys looking for Qualley—an okay but wasted Keith David and an annoying Beau Knapp—go after Crowe, so he has to team up with Gosling (and Rice).

There are various chase scenes, drunk comedy scenes, objectified young women (it’s the seventies so it’s okay), fight scenes, kidnappings, and so on. At one point, Knapp warns the real villain of the movie isn’t even in town yet, letting Crowe know he’s got a big fight in the third act.

At some point, Nice Guys becomes just a period-action comedy instead of something else with those themes. No one gets an actual character arc, just the potential for a sequel.

Both Crowe and Gosling seem like they’re playing sidekick to the star. Of the two… Crowe’s better most of the time. Rice is fine. Her performance is more successful thanks to script and blocking, but she’s charming enough.

As the film progresses, there’s more supporting cast introduced. Kim Basinger, Matt Bomer, Yaya DaCosta. Basinger’s terrible and derails the movie. Boomer’s terrible, but because of the script and the directing, he’s just aboard while it derails. DaCosta’s got a thin part, but she’s good.

Technically, Nice Guys is solid. Black’s direction is fine—he doesn’t have a single well-directed action sequence, though, which is a problem—Philippe Rousselot’s photography is good, John Ottman and David Buckley’s music always seems like it’s just about to get good and never does. The visual stars are obviously production designer Richard Bridgland and costume designer Kym Barrett’s recreation of seventies L.A. In some ways, it’s more impressive how much they’re able to recreate, not their actual designs.

Nice Guys is fine. It’s got a whole bunch of problems, and all of them are Black’s, but it’s fine. It’s better than the Shane Black movies it rips off but not better than the other movies it rips off.

Man of Steel (2013, Zack Snyder)

Man of Steel is good. It’s really good. Not only is it really good, I like it enough for a 500 word special.

There’s always a moment in a good action movie when it eventually runs out of steam and one has to give it some thought. There’s a breather scene, in other words. For Man of Steel, director Snyder uses flashbacks to Kevin Costner (as Superman’s dad) for the breather scenes and they aren’t breathers. They’re these intensely emotional scenes in between the action, which often have intense emotions too.

The present action of the film takes place over a few days, maybe a week. David S. Goyer’s script never gets exact–he’s dealing with alien spacecraft and a man who can fly so speeding between two locations isn’t a problem–but it never feels rushed. Snyder gets in a few nice little human moments for Superman Henry Cavill, who’s usually busy flying around the planet.

Snyder and Goyer take a moderately realistic approach to a super-powered alien suddenly flying around the globe. They seem to err on the side of excess–why would anyone get so excited about a guy in a red cape when there are alien spaceships too–but they know how to manage it. Snyder’s not original in his approach (he acknowledges his sources in a cute way) but he applies them well.

Snyder’s assured direction would be the star of Man of Steel if he weren’t consciously putting Cavill front and center. Michael Shannon gets a lot to do and he’s great; he and Cavill play wonderfully off each other. There’s a lot of nice subtext in their scenes. Shannon always gives the impression he’s holding back a little, making a well-timed outburst all the more effective.

As Lois Lane, Amy Adams does fine. She has surprisingly little to do, even though she’s undeniably integral. She’s not the star and Snyder and Goyer’s economy doesn’t allow for her to have much to herself.

Costner and Diane Lane are both excellent as Cavill’s adoptive parents. Snyder gets away with implying a lot about their relationship; the music from Hans Zimmer, Amir Mokri’s photography and David Brenner’s editing are essential to those implications. Snyder doesn’t exactly require a lot from his audience, but he’s definitely setting certain bars higher than others. The fight scenes, while technically magnificent, are still rather simple. The character stuff… he veers towards the sublime.

And there’s an even mix of character and action, even for the supporting cast (so when they forget someone, it’s unfortunately noticeable).

Russell Crowe’s good in the Brando role, surprisingly so, even if he’s around a little much. Not around enough is Ayelet Zurer as Cavill’s birth mother. She’s fantastic in her scenes. Antje Traue doesn’t have enough to do, but Goyer still takes the time to give her a whole arc with Christopher Meloni’s military guy.

Man of Steel can’t be much better. Goyer, Snyder and Cavill (and Zimmer) hit all the right notes.

Les Misérables (2012, Tom Hooper)

Thank goodness for Helena Bonham Carter and Sacha Baron Cohen… otherwise, someone might confuse Russell Crowe’s performance as the most inept in Les Misérables. Actually, Crowe’s quite a bit better than Eddie Redmayne and Amanda Seyfried too. Redmayne just can’t sing–neither can Crowe, but it doesn’t impair his acting too much–and Seyfried’s just misused. Director Hooper–possibly sticking to the original stage production–never bothers to establish her relationship with adoptive father Hugh Jackman. As a result, Seyfried never resonates.

As for Jackman, he’s good but the film takes place around him. It works when it’s Anne Hathaway, who’s absolutely amazing in the film and just one of her songs is worth sitting through the entire boring picture, but flops when it’s Redmayne. Samantha Barks is part of a love triangle with Redmayne and Seyfried and she’s not bad. She can’t carry the second half of the film though.

What’s so inexplicable about Les Misérables is the bad casting. Why anyone put Redmayne in it opposite someone who can obviously sing and act–Aaron Tveit–and then give Redmayne the bigger role is (artistically speaking) beyond me. Hooper mollycoddles about half the cast, which doesn’t do the film any favors.

Of course, Hooper doesn’t do it many favors himself. He can’t direct actors (child actor Daniel Huttlestone is atrocious) and he can’t direct the CG sequences either. The film looks absurdly silly at times, especially with Danny Cohen’s truly incompetent photography.

Hathaway and Jackman deserve a better production.

3:10 to Yuma (2007, James Mangold)

Another remake where they credit the original screenwriter as a contributing writer in order not to call it a remake.

Halsted Welles wrote the original 3:10 to Yuma’s screenplay… not sure why Mangold and the producers thought Michael Brandt and Derek Haas, writers of some vapid action movies, would match him.

I assume Brandt and Haas added the stuff where Logan Lerman (as Christian Bale’s kid, who tails along while Bale takes prisoner Russell Crowe to catch a prison train) is horrified to see how Chinese laborers were treated.

Yuma’s actually—with the exception of Marco Beltrami’s awful score—rather well-produced. Mangold composes the Panavision frame well. It’s not a significant film, but a competent one.

With the exception of the acting, of course. There’re so many people around Bale and Crowe, it barely feels like the two are supposed to be acting off each other. Worse, Bale’s terrible. The film opens with Lerman acting circles around him.

Mangold casts about half the film well and the other half awful. Gretchen Mol is Bale’s wife (and the only time he’s the better actor is in their scenes together). Peter Fonda’s weak, so’s Kevin Durand. However, Dallas Roberts, Alan Tudyk and Vinessa Shaw are all strong. Mangold’s got a surprise actor at one point and it livens things up. Yuma’s boring and not in a good way. Without a dynamic performance to match Crowe’s, it drags.

Well, Ben Foster’s pretty dynamic… but he’s not opposite Crowe.

It’s nearly decent.

1.5/4★½

CREDITS

Directed by James Mangold; screenplay by Halsted Welles, Michael Brandt and Derek Haas, based on a short story by Elmore Leonard; director of photography, Phedon Papamichael; edited by Michael McCusker; music by Marco Beltrami; production designer, Andrew Menzies; produced by Cathy Konrad; released by Lionsgate.

Starring Russell Crowe (Ben Wade), Christian Bale (Dan Evans), Ben Foster (Charlie Prince), Dallas Roberts (Grayson Butterfield), Peter Fonda (Byron McElroy), Gretchen Mol (Alice Evans), Alan Tudyk (Doc Potter), Kevin Durand (Tucker), Vinessa Shaw (Emma Nelson) and Logan Lerman (William Evans).

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Virtuosity (1995, Brett Leonard)

Virtuosity, being from the 1990s, is from the era when both Russell Crowe and Denzel Washington didn’t only appear in films directed by the Brothers Scott and Kelly Lynch was still in movies getting theatrical releases. It’s an early CG movie, with lots of computer references and set in the “near future.” It’s incredibly solid, however, for what it is–an action thriller.

Barely anything happens in the film not related to the main plot. There’s no romance between Washington and Lynch–partially, I’m sure, because of Washington’s boycott on interracial romances but also because there’s just no time for it. The movie’s present action is something like forty hours. Enough time to introduce conflict then go through a lot of action to resolve it.

While Washington’s great in the film, it’s a sturdy, leading man great. He’s barely charming here, as Virtuosity is well into his asexual film career (was it Gene Siskel who said he was the only guy who could play James Bond?). Instead it’s Crowe who gets to have all the fun, playing a psychotic virtual reality serial killer or something. It’s mostly about him just being crazy and good at it. It’s maybe not daring, but a lot more than what his acting has become.

Leonard’s a fine director. He can compose shots. It’s the 1990s, there’s a Peter Gabriel song over the end credits.

Unfortunately, the principal supporting cast member–Stephen Spinella–is beyond terrible. Amongst the sturdy character actors, he seriously hinders Virtuosity.

1/4★

CREDITS

Directed by Brett Leonard; written by Eric Bernt; director of photography, Gale Tattersall; edited by B.J. Sears and Rob Kobrin; music by Christopher Young; production designer, Nilo Rodis-Jamero; produced by Gary Lucchesi; released by Paramount Pictures.

Starring Denzel Washington (Lt. Parker Barnes), Kelly Lynch (Madison Carter), Russell Crowe (SID 6.7), Stephen Spinella (Lindenmeyer), William Forsythe (William Cochran), Louise Fletcher (Elizabeth Deane), William Fichtner (Wallace), Costas Mandylor (John Donovan) and Kevin J. O’Connor (Clyde Reilly).

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State of Play (2009, Kevin Macdonald)

Who has the least personality when it comes to State of Play? Director Kevin Macdonald? He shoots the most boring Panavision-sized frame I think I’ve ever seen. I’ve never seen a Brett Ratner movie from start to finish, but… Macdonald’s boring. He’s not bad, he’s just not any good at all. The lack of a distinctive screenwriter is also a problem–Matthew Michael Carnahan, Tony Gilroy and Billy Ray are all hacks. I mean, they’re–at times–fine hacks, but none of them is a distinctive screenwriter. They’re the kind of guys Carrie Fisher comes in to fix up and, watching State of Play, one can’t help but think she rewrote the scenes between Russell Crowe and Robin Wright.

But it’s not just the behind-the-camera talent… no one in front of the camera has any personality either. I mean, Helen Mirren does because she occasionally swears with her British accent. It’s The Queen swearing; laugh. And the audience does laugh, because it’s why she’s swearing. For comic relief. State of Play is a newspaper drama in the post-newspaper age, which means lots of derogatory blog comments. But, you know what? It doesn’t provide a useful defense of printed media. There’s nothing, after all the film’s emphasis on Crowe as the traditional reporter and sidekick Rachel McAdams as the blogger, to show McAdams’s blog couldn’t have done all the narrative’s whistle-blowing.

McAdams and Crowe are both fine. Really, they’re fine. I mean, they have all the personality of a “Tonight Show” guest and it’s like the film’s producers didn’t understand Crowe is an actor, not a screen presence, so casting him in a lousy role, one needing a presence, was a bad idea. McAdams is the same situation. She has no character and no personality. For the majority of the film, State of Play relies on Mirren for relief. Sometimes, it’s Wright. She’s been doing these crappy wife roles for ten years, so it’s no surprise she doesn’t break a sweat doing another one, even one where she’s supposedly married to Ben Affleck.

Ben Affleck is, at the time of this film’s release, thirty-seven years old. Russell Crowe is forty-five. Robin Wright is forty-three. Crowe and Wright look fine together. State of Play puts Affleck in a bunch of aging make-up. He looks silly. It’s unbelievable he, Crowe and Wright went to college together. It’s unbelievable he and Crowe ever knew each other before the film’s present action. Affleck and Wright are both solid enough to make their marriage, however silly-looking thanks to Affleck’s make-up, work.

Affleck gives the film’s second best performance, after Mirren. Then, I guess, Wright. Then everyone else. They really don’t matter. Andy Garcia would have been far superior in the Crowe role. Anyone with some kind of non-character-based screen presence. Russell Crowe’s an actor, not a matinee star. State of Play needed a matinee star.

Originally, it was going to be Brad Pitt in the Crowe role and Edward Norton in the Affleck role. With them, the film would have at least made sense. It wouldn’t have been good unless Macdonald was gone and the script got a rewrite from a real writer.

Wait, I forgot about Jason Bateman. He gave the film’s best performance. He was fantastic.

1/4★

CREDITS

Directed by Kevin Macdonald; written by Matthew Michael Carnahan, Tony Gilroy and Billy Ray, based on the television series by Paul Abbott; director of photography, Rodrigo Prieto; edited by Justine Wright; music by Alex Heffes; production designer, Mark Friedberg; produced by Andrew Hauptman, Eric Fellner and Tim Bevan; released by Universal Pictures.

Starring Russell Crowe (Cal McAffrey), Ben Affleck (Stephen Collins), Rachel McAdams (Della Frye), Helen Mirren (Cameron Lynne), Robin Wright (Anne Collins), Jason Bateman (Dominic Foy), Jeff Daniels (Rep. George Fergus), Michael Berresse (Robert Bingham), Harry Lennix (Det. Donald Bell), Josh Mostel (Pete), Michael Weston (Hank), Barry Shabaka Henley (Gene Stavitz) and Viola Davis (Dr. Judith Franklin).

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Rough Magic (1995, Clare Peploe)

Rough Magic isn’t a bad idea, it’s just poorly plotted. Most of the movie takes place in Mexico, where it’s mildly engaging and generally amusing (except when Paul Rodriguez shows up to annoy and he is incredibly annoying). Notice all the qualifiers? The movie starts strong and even gives the impression of ending strong (it doesn’t). For example, D.W. Moffett’s excellent in period pieces and most of his work is in the first fifteen minutes and the last fifteen minutes. Clare Peploe’s direction is good overall, but during the first act, it’s much better than the rest of the film.

I had assumed, given how disjointed the narrative gets–it becomes about Russell Crowe (who’s mediocre with a shifty accent and is actually better when he’s the protagonist) instead of Bridget Fonda–the novel was something obscure and maybe good, a thought I rarely have when watching an adaptation. However, the novel’s some pulp from the early 1940s, so I doubt it’s a literary masterwork and I’m wondering how much of the script is new. I’m assuming most, given how particular the setting is to the story, but I suppose it’s possible the big disconnect (from Mexico back to Los Angeles) did come from the novel. Because anyone working on the script should have seen right away it was off.

Bridget Fonda’s great, though she and Crowe don’t have much chemistry for much of the film, and she has some great scenes. Richard Schiff, Andy Romano, Kenneth Mars, Jim Broadbent–very strong supporting cast.

It’s too bad it doesn’t work out, but it becomes clear once the story moves to Mexico it isn’t going to… and then it alternates between amusing and trying, with the Rodriguez scenes something terrible.

1/4★

CREDITS

Directed by Clare Peploe; screenplay by Robert Mundi, William Brookfield and Peploe, based on a novel by James Hadley Chase; director of photography, John J. Campbell; edited by Suzanne Fenn; music by Richard Hartley; production designer, Waldemar Kalinowski; produced by Declan Baldwin and Laurie Parker; released by Goldwyn Films Inc.

Starring Bridget Fonda (Myra), Russell Crowe (Alex Ross), Jim Broadbent (Doc Ansell), D.W. Moffett (Cliff Wyatt), Kenneth Mars (Ivan the Terrific), Paul Rodriguez (Diego), Andy Romano (Clayton), Richard Schiff (Wiggins) and Euva Anderson (Tojola).

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L.A. Confidential (1997, Curtis Hanson)

I haven’t seen L.A. Confidential since 1998 or so, whenever the laserdisc came out. Before the film came out–I saw it in the theaters of course, being a big Russell Crowe fan back then–I read James Ellroy’s book. So, obviously, the film cuts a lot and I don’t remember the book very well, except that it took place over a long period of time. I don’t think it was that good, but you did get to know the characters… You don’t in L.A. Confidential: The Movie. Instead, you get to know and care when the filmmakers tell you to care. It’s Oscar-bait. As I started watching it, I thought it would be okay Oscar-bait, but it really isn’t. For a few reasons.

First, since I’ll be on and on about it if I don’t get it out of the way: Kim Basinger. 1) She does not look like Veronica Lake, she does not resemble Veronica Lake, never in a million years would I think she does. According to IMDb, Izabella Scorupco turned down the role and she owes me dinner for the thirty minutes or so of Basinger “acting” I just had to endure. 2) Kim Basinger is awful. The number of films, probably starting with Batman, that she has hurt or ruined with her aforementioned “acting” probably equals the number of films she has “acted” in. I sort of remember once saying Nine 1/2 Weeks was her only reasonable acting job. Since I haven’t seen it in a long time, I won’t make such a claim. However, after seeing her “talents” on display in L.A. Confidential, I doubt I’d be able to reinforce said claim.

There: a paragraph for Basinger’s bad acting. Does Guy Pearce get a whole paragraph? Maybe. He is not good. His character needs to be good. The audience needs to identify with him, not against him. We aren’t suppose to think cops beating the shit out of and murdering innocent (or misdemeanor-committing) people is okay. Does that mean Pearce is actually so good that I’m just upset because he was so good–he was supposed to appear unlikable, correct? No, he was terrible. The scenes between him and Basinger at the end were awful. Not to mention how terrible their actual sex scene was. That was a special kind of awful. Made me want to stick pencils in my ears to break the drums.

However–and I’m breaking up the crap with some pearls–Russell Crowe is good. He has very little do. Most of his scenes are with Basinger and so he had no one to work with, but he still shines through. His character is decent and deserving of a better film. However, L.A. Confidential has got to be one of Kevin Spacey’s best performances. Since Spacey has turned into such an embarrassing Oscar-whore (sort of like Crowe), I’d forgotten how good he could be. If L.A. Confidential had been about Spacey’s redemption… Oh, one can only dream. The film also has David Straithairn and underuses him, which is an incredible affront to the species.

No, the problem with the film, why it doesn’t achieve or overcome the awful acting, is the writing. Brian Helgeland and Curtis Hanson kept a couple parts of the book (I think, the Nite Owl murders seem to be how I remember), tossed the rest, but kept scenes from the book and lines of dialogue. Scenes and lines that mean nothing without the rest of the book. Or they didn’t keep the rhyming parts. So, the film deceives. In the middle, until about the 90 minute mark, it still seems like something good could come of all this stuff. A period cop movie called The Nite Owl Murders could have been amazing, but this film isn’t a cop movie. It’s not noir or neo-noir or anything like that. It’s Oscar-bait and, as Oscar-bait goes, I suppose it’s on par for 1997. If I remember correctly, 1997 was actually a good year, it was just that a bunch of shit was popular… as it goes. Gattaca, for instance, was from 1997. Comparing the two films is an incredible insult to Gattaca and possibly the whole idea of art in general.

I watched the DVD (my laserdisc is probably long gone–I rented the DVD for a buck and quarter and the laser cost $32 from Ken Crane’s). There are some audio looping problems, but I don’t think it’s the disc, because I noticed the mouths didn’t match the dialogue. Maybe there’s a good version of it out there somewhere, in the Warner vaults or something, but I really doubt it….

One last thing about 1997. I just saw that it’s the year Air Force One came out. I’ve never pinpointed, specifically, the downfall of American popular cinema. I can tell you when it was good, when it was better than it is now, and when everything was shit. But is there a turning point? I think it might be Air Force One–you had the previously reliable Harrison Ford in a complete piece of garbage. Petersen was already done, so I’m not putting anything on him, so I think I’ll hang it all on Ford whoring himself for money–in Air Force One. With a few blips–and pretty insignificant ones–his career has been downhill from that specific film. So it’s all his fault. I guess. None of this rant had anything to do with L.A. Confidential….

Okay, I’m done. (Damn Izabella Scorupco. Somebody ought to make her sit down and watch Basinger epic The Real McCoy over and over again. Except cut out all the Val Kilmer parts, because he was funny).