* The Sundance Film Festival, easily the second most influential film festival in the world, both for better and for worse, unveiled its 2010 schedule this morning. Anne Thompson takes a close look at the impact of Jim Cooper, who is now running the festival after the departure of Geoff Gilmour. At the one and only Sundance I attended back in 2005, I heard a number of catty, though possibly not inaccurate, remarks to the effect that Gilmour had gone a bit Hollywood in a somewhat James Lipton-esque way. Apparently, things are changing and change is often a good thing.
* Paul Thomas Anderson’s new film is supposedly not about Scientology and, therefore, Philip Seymour Hoffman will not be playing a variation on L. Ron Hubbard. Still, sounds cool. Boy, I wish I had time to check out Anderson’s last film and huge creative departure, “There Will Be Blood,” a second time right now. Jason Zingale’s review might have been short of adoring, but that one has really stayed with me. P.T. Anderson might not be the second coming of Orson Welles, but then, Welles wasn’t exactly the second coming of John Ford either.
* Roman Polanski isn’t going to be set free this week, but he is going to the Milky Way — the name of his digs in the swanky Swiss ski resort town of Gstaad.
* Rupert Everett, who made a bit of history a decade or so back as the first borderline A-list actor to be openly gay, has warned younger actors not to follow suit in new book promo interview in The Guardian. Personally, I’d advise gay performers to take his words with a gigantic grain of salt. Everett is a first rate actor I always enjoy watching but he has, to put it kindly, a big mouth and has said many really questionable things over the years while also saying some really smart things. Not being gay or a famous thespian, I’m perhaps not qualified to judge, but being out sure hasn’t hurt Neil Patrick Harris any lately. I guess the real test will be if the highly accomplished ex-Doogie is ever allowed to play a more or less serious romantic lead opposite a female.
Nikki Finke has the thoughts of “coming-out PR guru” Howard Bragman:
There may well have been other reasons Rupert didn’t become the leading man he imagined himself going to be. But this isn’t about your bank account. This is about your soul.
* Bloody Disgusting has word that the remake of Alfred Hitchcock‘s “The Birds” is getting a change of directors and will be heading in a direction that will be, yes, more bloody and disgusting.
* In Michael Powell’s horror classic, “Peeping Tom,” a silent-film era cameraman is driven to become a serial killer by the bizarre, fear-inducing experiments performed on him as a child by his psychologist father. A linguist named d’Armond Speers might have been less cruel than the dad in the movie, but speaking only Klingon to his son for the first three years of his life seems like it’s taking some kind of risk. Fortunately, as passed along by Geoff Boucher, it appears the kid turned out normal, linguistically speaking, anyhow. That’s good. Still, I wonder what the word in Klingon is for “meshugeneh.”
For all the buzz surrounding the film coming out of Sundance, you’d think “World’s Greatest Dad” was one of the funniest comedies of the year. Alas, it isn’t as great as many people made it out to be, but writer/director Bobcat Goldthwait’s sophomore effort is still a must-see for anyone who likes a little variety in their moviegoing diet. Robin Williams stars as Lance Clayton, a high school poetry teacher with dreams of becoming a published writer. Everything he’s ever written has been rejected up until now, so when his jackass son Kyle (Daryl Sabara) dies from auto-erotic asphyxiation, Lance is given the opportunity to exploit the tragic accident, as long as he can learn to live with himself for it. Though that may sound a little too dark to be considered a comedy, there are definitely laughs to be had – just not very many of them. In fact, the movie works better during its more dramatic moments thanks to Williams’ strong performance, and though you wouldn’t expect it to be so touching, “World’s Greatest Dad” is at its best when exploring the instictive love that a father has for his son.
