Quote Of The Day

"Look into the eyes of a chicken and you will see real stupidity. It is a kind of bottomless stupidity, a fiendish stupidity. They are the most horrifying, cannibalistic and nightmarish creatures in the world"

-- Werner Herzog

Tunes Currently Fondling My Inner Thigh

1) Coney Island Baby - Tom Waits
2) More Than This - Roxy Music
3) Waiting In Vain - Bob Marley
4) When You're Smiling - Louis Armstrong
5) Yellow Ledbetter - Pearl Jam
6) So Hardcore - Busta Rhymes
7) Where Is My Mind? - The Pixies
8) Sunday Morning - The Velvet Underground
9) Awake - Electric Guest
10) Caravan - Van Morrison

JB.

It's Not That You're Short...

One of the greatest break-up scenes ever. Enjoy.



JB.

So Close, Yet...

So, a week after a spectacular "Master" related five days and the hangover has officially set in. As I've mentioned previously on these here pages, one of the most difficult aspects of pursuing a career in "the arts" is the comedown. Typically this is directly related to the joys of creation. As in, the tangible joy you feel when creating something you love is soon a distant memory after it's finished. Like any good boozing session, the fallout will carry you through a couple of days but, silently and potently, reality will eventually set back in, usually upon receiving a pile of bills. Thus begins the hangover phase.

This time however it was different. For I was not creating anything. Even worse, I was there, and I mean right there, with those that had created and created at the highest level....right, I'll stop being cryptic....being around famous, successful people made me feel worryingly good and I am thoroughly disliking being relegated back to lowly piss-ant status. There, I said it.

You see, in the film industry, one of the chief perks of being successful - be it as an Actor, Director, Writer, Editor, Producer, whatever - is that you simply just get better treatment than everyone else. It's a painful truth, folks, but having seen it first hand it is a truth nonetheless. Everything is free, you get to go where you please, do what you want and, get to meet and communicate your idols, get to work with whoever you want to and to be around it, as much as it pains me to admit it, felt pretty bloody good. Once you're in, you're in. You know what I mean?

Now, I understand there are several factors to consider. One, me getting into a couple of films, saying hello to a few of my idols (who will never remember me in a million years) and eating some free muffins does not, repeat does not, constitute fame and/or success in any way, shape or form. Two, there is a price to pay for these privileges (for most people, anyway) and that price is fame itself. You can no longer masturbate with your bay window curtains undrawn, or have a peaceful shit on your front lawn. Gone are those days. As Dave Chapelle once said "you can never become un-famous". However, when you're at an International Film Festival, it is like a secret society - where everyone understands each other's plight, casually sipping money-free beverages and discussing their next collaborative masterpiece - and to be right there amongst it all, everything suddenly seemed so real, so feasible, so easy. My dreams were right there in front of me....getting hammered. However, I got only a brief glimpse behind this curtain before being, as those who haven't earned their place there do, unceremoniously tossed back to the gutter. Now it all feels far, far away again. This is the problem.

Now, don't get me wrong, fame is not something I covet at all. It's the success and the whole "once you're in, you're in" thing I'm after. My motto in the past year, one that I've had to batter into my numb, lazy skull, is that nothing is easy in this industry and I do mean literally nothing. The most menial of tasks, like sending a DVD to a festival for screening (as I'm doing now) requires a great deal of time and effort, for reasons which are frankly too dull to get into here (it's to do with projection in case you're interested). Every time you think you've made it over the hump, another one appears twice the size. Of course, it is at these moments where I seek solace in the fact that if it was wasn't monumentally difficult, then everyone would do it. All you can do is get back on the horse and ride. Again, and again, and again.

I don't know what my point is. Sometimes you don't need one. Sometimes it's good to just be pointless.

JB.

Dialogue Of The Day

"God isn't interested in technology. He cares nothing for the microchip or the silicon revolution. Look how he spends his time - forty-three species of Parrot. Nipples for men. Slugs! HE created slugs! They can't hear. They can't speak. They can't operate machinery. Are we not in the hands of a lunatic?"

From "Time Bandits" (1981)

Formal, Impersonal, Bullet-Point Updates

Here's the latest scoop...

* Saw "The Master" for a second time at a private screening in LA. This time around I was completely blown away. Instead of looking for wasn't there, I focused on what was and what was there was utterly brilliant. Not for everyone though, I'm sure. Also, this time I sat up the front. This is a must. Never have I had a film (and glorious 70MM film) dominate my senses in such a way. Beautiful film.

* My film "Love Is..." got into the Hollywood Film Festival. This is very good news as I'm told this festival is a very good one. Been working on press-kit type stuff. All very surreal.

* "Starving In Hollywood" - the sketch show I've been working on, now has an IndieGoGo campaign. Please, if you feel so inclined, visit the page and give generously. Good and lovely things will come your way if you do. http://www.indiegogo.com/StarvingInHollywood?a=814159

* Watched Clint Eastwood's Speech at the Republican Convention. Absolutely cringe-worthy. Stick to acting, mate. Politics is clearly not your forte.

* This is the most gorgeously weird piece of music I've heard in a while. Fact:



* Found out that Deer have no gall bladders. Who would've known?

End Transmission.

JB.

Master-Baiting in Toronto

Good people of the interweb, I have just returned from my first ever trip to Canada and I am disappointed to say that I did not encounter one flapping head, no beady-eyes, and not a single episode of "Terrence and Philip". However what I did encounter was the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), which was absolutely mental. Never have I been to a place where you're happily walking along having a chat and a coffee, when a black suburban pulls up next to you and out steps Johnny Depp...into a throng of screaming fans. It was like that at every turn. Like I say, mental.

I was there to accompany my dear friend, and cast member of my own film, Jennie to the North American premiere of another (and, some may say, better) film she's in, which happened to be none other than Paul Thomas Anderson's "The Master". As we arrived in town on Friday, to say I was a little excited about the event would be grossly ignoring the damp spot forming in my undergarments. I was giddy as a fawn. As the day progressed my excitement slowly crept further and further up the scale until there was nowhere left to go but alcohol-land...and go there I did. It was all free, after all. 

By the time all the pre-party and red carpet and screaming fans and famous mugs and VIP status and oddly-named cocktails had settled, it might be a safe assumption to say that I was not in the most coherent state I'd ever been in. Then, all of a sudden, the man himself appeared. PTA took the stage to mass applause, saying a very brief hello before the lights went down and the show began. 

What then followed was the single most absurd cinematic experience I had ever witnessed. Here was I, a lowly piss-ant, sitting in this grand old theatre in downtown Toronto, watching the premiere of PTA's new film, sitting among the glitterati. I was severely struggling to simply get over that fact. Luckily the film soon took effect and all that other shite was a distant memory.

In the first five minutes, the first obvious thing that struck me, and I'm sure I'm not alone in saying this, was the absolute gorgeousness of the thing. It was shot on 65mm film (basically an old-school version of IMAX) and projected on 70mm. The results, in a time where film is slowly but surely being phased out, were absolutely astonishing. If it doesn't win every Cinematography award under the sun, I'll eat my hat. For those who think digital is the future (both filming and projection) shame on you. My only gripe being that there weren't more shots of glorious epic landscapes to enjoy in this spectacular format.

The reason for that was the story itself, which is about two-men locked in a mental power struggle. Those two men are the sole focus of the film, so much so in fact that almost every other character who appeared seemed to be soft-focus somehow - just part of the backdrop. Joaquin Phoenix puts in one of the most unhinged, deranged performances of all time, however my opinion was that Philip Seymour Hoffman stole the show. His performance, as the silver-tongued leader of a semi-religious 'group' called The Cause, was the best I've seen him give in a career littered with amazing performances. My only hope is that he'll get the credit he deserves. 

When the credits rolled, I felt as if I'd been beaten about the skull. Three days later and I still find myself thinking about it, which in my eyes, is a thing sorely lacking in cinema today. I can't really offer any kind of conclusive "was it good or not" type summary - it was, after all, a VERY strange night - but I will be seeing it again soon, and if any film needed seeing more than once, it's this one. Meanwhile, the below track (from the mighty Jonny Greenwood) sort of sums it all up in the space of four minutes. Enjoy.

Cheers,

JB. 

Van The Man

Sing it loud, sing it proud.



JB.