The Slate: Twilight, Jean-Luc Godard and Mountain Goats

Gus van Sant, Sofia Coppola, Bill Condon … are any of them crazy enough to say “yes” to directing an installment of Twilight: Breaking Dawn? Probably not. Y’know, van Sant just might do it. (EW)

The line-up of this year’s 32nd Cinema du Reel Film Festival in Paris will include Godard/Mieville’s The Old Place and Reportage Amateur, as well as Richard Dindo’s promising Gaugin in Tahiti and the Marquesas Islands. Fest kicks off on March 18. (Cineuropa)

Speaking of Godard: “His devotion to the concept of the archive—including archival footage—is based in a sense of the object’s relic-like, totemic power that transcends evocation and memory to achieve a quasi-metaphysical incarnation of the past that restores its force through mythopoetic power, through the fact of its iconic contact with the past.” Right. (The Front Row)

Rian Johnson’s Life of the World to Come, starring the Mountain Goats’ John Darnielle, is released on DVD on Record Store Day, sounds a lot like that Jonsi doc, Go Quiet. (Pitchfork)

Happy Birthday, Jean-Luc Godard

Go Go Godard!

Pondering a return to blogging. In the meantime, here’s the trailer for Jean-Luc Godard’s Socialisme. It’s got books and cars and maybe even a narrative. Thanks to the Front Row for pointing this out.

Career Advice for Lindsay Lohan

Lindsay Lohan needs a job, dammit. Remember when she had “that Jodie Foster sort of seriousness and intent focus beneath her teenage persona“? Them days are gone. A friend has told the Daily Newsthat the actress is living on Samantha Ronson’s trust fund and the odd personal appearance. As one “pal” puts it:

“Lindsay’s money situation has never been great, but it’s only gotten worse over the last month. For every dollar she makes, she spends double. Her personal appearance fees are literally the only thing keeping her afloat. But here’s the rub: Because of her explosive relationship with Sam, she’s unable to get the type of cash she’s used to. The negative press and constant appearance cancellations are hurting her pocketbook.”

“Explosive,” you say?

Anyway, she’s coked up, seriously Sapphic, and her latest film is going straight to DVD. So what’s a faded star threatened with getting cut off to do?

We have the solution. Lohan needs to cut bait on her Mouseketeer/America’s Sweetheart persona and get in the art-house groove. There are plenty of directors out there taking home Cannes prizes and still starving. So Li-Lo, fire the agent, lower your rate and offer yourself up to them. You’ve already crossed the nudity Rubicon. Maybe it could be a journey into the disturbed psyche of a sexually frustrated woman. Or how about a journey into the disturbed psyche of an bored housewife. Or maybe just make a movie with Gaspar Noe. How about helping a poor auteur dust off one of those old Robbe-Grilletscripts that most be lying around? After the jump, we take a look at a handful of other glamour queens who decided to get their art house on. Lohan, hear us out: Jean-Luc Godard is still working!

Critical Bitchslap: A.O. Scott vs. Richard Brody

Imagine a war between the New York Times and the New Yorker, and you might think of Walter Burns tossing inkpots at the effete Eustace Tilly. In fact, it appears to be the other way around. A.O. Scott’s elegant consideration of a certain type of American Neo-Realism has been blasted via a pugnacious blog post from Richard Brody. After an initial exchange of fire, both returned for another salvo. The various broadsides can be read here, here, here and here. But for those who would just prefer to fall asleep without moving their mouse, here’s Squally’s scorecard.

It all started when A.O. Scott, as is his wont, looked over a series of forthcoming films and attempted to write a serviceable trend piece colored with his usual thoughtful commentary. In the best New York Sunday Magazine style, he explained to readers something they presumably hadn’t noticed before and gave them a bit of a back scratch as well. That “something” was the adaptation of Neo-realist techniques by filmmakers like Ramin Bahrani (Man Push Cart) and Kelly Reichardt (Wendy and Lucy), occasioned by the release of Bahrani’s Goodbye Solo, Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden‘s Sugar and So Yong Kim‘s Treeless Mountain in the next few weeks.

These films, he wrote, represented “an urge to escape from escapism,” an alternative to films like Watchmen, Knowing, and whatever else they’re condemned to watch in Greeley, Colorado. Each has several features in common with the classics of the postwar Italian Neo-realist movement, films such as Roma, citta aperta/Open City, La Terra Trema/The Earth Trembles and Ladri di biciclette/Bicycle Thieves. They are made during a time of economic and political upheaval. They use non-professionals in fictional roles that are close to their real selves. They are filmed on location and make use of “unadorned, specific” locales (Rome, Winston-Salem, N.C., a mountain village in South Korea). They emphasize work–whether as a profession, at home, or in the school. Although Italian Neo-realism passed mainstream American cinema by, these films look to foreign movies and are intent in showing the “American life that remains off screen.” While subdued in nature, these films can be ultimately inspiring in how they portray strength/resilience in the face of adversity.

All seems innocuous enough. But not so for Brody the firebrand blogger at New Yorker’s Front Row. In a numbered list and with a shaky criteria that recalls the manner of his New Wave heroes (Brody has written the acclaimed Everything is Cinema: The Working Life of Jean-Luc Godard), Brody swings at the Old Grey Lady’s oracle … and swings wildly.

Chuck Jones Gets One Froggy Evening

Tuesday night (March 24) you’ll want to lock grandma in the attic, send the kids to bed early, and see the significant other off to their card night. Actually, you won’t have to do any of those things, because any human being with a beating heart and at least one brain cell is gonna get a kick out of what’s going down. TCM is devoting a night to the great animator Chuck Jones, beginning at 8 PM EST. The centerpiece is Chuck Jones: Memories of Childhood, a half-hour documentary which features the late, great Bugs Bunny/Road Runner animator recounting in his signature style in 1997.

According to Cartoon Brew, the film features clips from his work and new animations made out of Jones’ sketches by John Canemaker (The Moon and the Son: An Imagined Conversation). The doc and interview portions appear to focus specifically on Jones’ childhood, which should give the Freudian scholars out there a little something to play with. The real meat will be what follows: 11 classic shorts dating from 1938 to 1967 and Jones’ feature take on kids’ classic The Phantom Tollbooth.

Trailerama Classic: Made in USA

One of Jean-Luc Godard’s hardest-to-find films, based on a Richard Stark story and the final feature-length kiss-off to his cinematic muse Anna Karina. Characters named Richard Widmark and Robert McNamara make appearances, as does Marianne Faithfull. Due for re-release by Rialto on April 1.