Archive for the ‘Film Discussion’ Category

Wrapped up my stay with Stagger Lee in Corona Del Mar tonight and made my way north, back to C-City and the grind. Round two with the meetings starts tomorrow. Currently we have three on the books for this week. I’ll cover them as we go. Going to be speaking with the Feature Agents tomorrow. Hopefully we’ll get the fire going as well, soon.

Sad to say good-bye to Stagger. He’s my dear, dear four-legged pal. Always sleeps right by the door to the room I stay in, so he knows when I go to bed at night. Usually he’s there when I wake up, if I’m late getting going in the morning.

Had a fabulous dinner with Polly, Will, and J.P. before heading back. It was the perfect cap to my stay. We had a grand time at Gulfstream catching up. It’s always so wonderful to see them. Before, J.P. and I had an in-depth conversation about the first grade, how much he likes to not go to school, and how he tries to fool his mother into thinking he’s sick. We covered all the bases. (I refrained from getting into the “Doc” story.) He was not too thrilled with the prospect of homework every night. And at dinner, Will and I talked movies a bit. Mainly Harry Potter, but we also dipped into Toy Story 3 (which he hadn’t seen yet, but I recommended highly) and Despicable Me which got a thumbs down, despite the Henchmen. Will is quite the young man these days, too! The only bummer was that Joe and Matt weren’t back yet. I always love my time with Polly, but when the rest of the clan is added to the mix, it’s a special treat.

After dinner, I made my way up U.S. 1, the PCH, through the coastal towns – all quiet on a Monday night for the most part. The last few shades of dusk heavy in the sky against a thin band of faraway autumnal burnt orange on my left, streaking what was left of the Pacific’s horizon, lingering out past the endless beaches and white-tipped waves rolling over the deep blue. The last few beats of sunset fading in the cool night air. Window down all the way rolling up the coastline, alone with my thoughts, all the way back to L.A.

New feature here at the Wire. I’ve been meaning actually to do it for some time now, but had never quite gotten around to it for one reason or another. I enjoy Friday Night Randoms. It may seem silly, but having a form when I sit down to compose the post makes it easier – especially after a long day of writing. With this new feature we’re gonna shift the focus a bit and try a content directive for Saturday nights, which are usually pretty quiet in my world these days.

It’s pretty simple and I would guess if anyone is reading this – you’all will know what I’m up to with the title of the post. Regardless, just so I lay out some ground rules for my own self, here’s the focus: Every Saturday night, I’ll endeavor to write a review. It will most likely be on some form of entertainment as I’m obviously immersed in the field. That being said, I will endeavor to move beyond just entertainment and challenge myself to write about some of my other interests – food, gadgets, iced coffee, and whatever else makes its way into my orbit and steals my attention. I’ll also try to keep it brief, or relatively brief and tothe point – my reaction, basically, and what I liked or disliked about it or why I think it has merit or not.

The idea stems from something I’ve been meaning to do for a much longer time than this blog or blog’s in general have been around. Back in college, I started to think to myself – “You should take out a notebook and record, like a journal, every movie you watch. Just a brief reaction, a few sentences and see in ten years how many notebooks I have (even then I watched a ton of movies.) Well, I never got around to it. So, in a way, this is my nod to that initial impulse. And with that, we’ll kick things off with a movie review.

GET LOW

Saw it tonight with JJ and Cheyna. I knew almost absolutely nothing about the film before seeing it. Which is a bit rare these days. It’s directed by a first time director/longtime cinematographer, Aaron Schneider and written by a former writer on Mad Men, current writer for Justified (along with another writer) Chris Provenzano.

I won’t get too much into the story. The cast includes Robert Duvall, Bill Murray, and Sissy Spacek. It’s based in part on a real event that’s become something of a legend in Tennessee. I will admit the cast above is what got me to say yes to going tonight, but the writing and directing really stuck with me after. Don’t get me wrong – it’s a star turn for Mr. Duvall and Bill Murray, as well as Sissy Spacek turn in fabulous performances as well. I mean, the acting in this picture is superb. I wouldn’t be surprised, completely to see an Academy Award nomination in their somewhere – especially between Murray and Duvall.

But, the story itself, and more importantly, the understated but poignant directing. This film is such a beautifully told tale. It’s the kind of movie I feel audiences are starved for. A film that has laughs, but definitely brought tears to my eyes at several points – especially at the end which was so touching and beautiful. This film is a classic example of the old storytelling maxim – complex characters, simple plots – that’s what makes great movies. This couldn’t be more evident in a film like Get Low.

If you’re starved, post-summer blockbuster season – to see a humane, rich, low key film that has laughs, breaks your heart, but makes you feel so warm inside when the credits roll (and you haven’t seen The Kids Are Alright yet) then get out and see the folkys, charming Get Low. I was so thrilled when I walked out of the theater tonight. It’s such a treat to not know what I’m about to watch and then have it steal my heart. That’s the best of both worlds for me!

All right, thanks for playing. Be good to yourself and go see this film!

I saw a touching, hilarious movie today that got so many things right, and was so near perfect, I’m still bowled over by it.

After seeing this movie, I would surmise that, much like SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE, this film – director Lisa Cholodenko’s THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT -  could very well catch a wave of serious momentum and excellent word of mouth and make a run at BEST PICTURE/BEST DIRECTOR, if not BEST ACTRESS and BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR and ACTRESSS, as well as BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY.  The movie was that good.

It stars Annette Benning, Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo, Mia Wasikowska (who you might recall as Alive in Tim Burton’s ALICE IN WONDERLAND), and Josh Hutcherson (who’s been in a bunch of stuff when he was younger, but hasn’t really hit it yet.)  And was written by Cholodenko and writer Stuart Blumberg (who’s best know for writing Edward Norton’s directorial debut, KEEPING THE FAITH, which was a well-written film. There is so much to be amazed by and love in this film – almost every piece of it is a revelation, as is the whole. The performances are nothing short of stunning – all of them. Though, the two teenagers are beyond exceptional and it might very well be Julianne Moore’s greatest performance – so far out of what we;re used to seeing from her. She was spellbinding in MAGNOLIA, but that was more ferocious. Her character here is so much more vulnerable and sweet and real, not to mention frustrated and hilarious and goofy. I mean there are so many layers happening and none of them – in her performance, in the other performances, or even in the entire film, bring the experience crashing down. It’s a testament to the knock-your-socks-off directing achievement that  Cholodenko accomplishes. Her previous films, HIGH ART and LAUREL CANYON, while fantastic, did not achieve this total level of savvy, heartfelt confidence to let the story and characters be the story and characters and then the deft ability to mine the insight and wisdom she poured into the script in the way she constructed the film.

I mean, the use of silence alone, was just masterful. One of the most telling things I can say, in regards to how absolutely perfect the direction is, was that in certain moments I would expect an emotional moment to be explained to death, or an obvious lantern hung on it (that’s screenwriter slang) some important emotional bit or plot bit with a few lines of dialogue or key narrative points/set-ups to be remade with repeated bits or actorly business. I expect these things because we’re dogged (as writers) with notes to “clarify,” “you’re being too smart for the room,” “take it down a bit,” “Make it clearer” and so a facial expression or a moment of silence between two characters is too subtle, no one will get that, so make sure they say several times, outright, “I’m mad at you” or “I love you because of x,y,and z” then cutaway to a close-up of x,y, and z. It’s storytelling with a sledgehammer. In THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT, I would hit those moments and be looking for the lantern to be hung on them or the sledgehammer to come out and it never did. Not once. I was bowled over at this by the end. There was nothing pat or easy about the consequences for and the growth of all the characters. It was life in all its glory, a modern family navigating the rocky shoals of being a modern family, together, despite all their everyday ups and downs.

I could rave on and on. I immediately wanted to head back in and watch it again. I fear I’m hyping it too much, but I don’t know if I care with this film. So often these days, films of this nature – personal, real, adult dramas with some humor and pathos mixed in – films that dare to not give in to marketing plans and test audiences and demographics, but rather follow the heart of the story they weave and leave it at that – with all the loose ends and silences and sweet, unexplained moments that come with being true to an honest narrative – get lost in the shuffle, can’t find financing, get buried at the box office. Trust me, I don’t mean to get on a soap box. I kind of like to write those big, brawling summer movies; but I also like the heartfelt character drama and I guess I just don’t understand anymore why – in this huge, successful industry – it has to be on or the other? Why can’t we have both and encourage both? We used to and we were so much better for it.

I have included a link to the NY Times review. Normally, I wouldn’t encourage anyone to read a film review in advance of seeing the film, if at all. I don’t think film criticism can be entirely trusted in this country these days, even at the venerable New York Times. By that I mean that, instead of focusing on analyzing the film as a film, critics now seem to have shifted to analyzing a film as a business proposition and a pop culture artifact all at once, with little regard for its cinematic intent. Anyways, this review, by A.O. Scott, nails the feeling I had walking out of the theater and my thoughts on the THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT, hours later, after I had been able to really process the wonder and thrill of seeing such a truly fabulous piece of work.

NY TIMES Review of THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT

If you don’t wish to read it though, and I understand entirely if you don’t; I’ve included a quote below, which I think really sums up all that the movie accomplishes and has to offer:

Ms. Cholodenko’s film, which she wrote with Stuart Blumberg, is so canny in its insights and so agile in its negotiation of complex emotions that it deserves to stand on its own. It is outrageously funny without ever exaggerating for comic effect, and heartbreaking with only minimal melodramatic embellishment.

It is in very limited release right now, but hopefully it will finds its way into a true, wide release. I’m actually a little stunned its being released in the middle of the summer. It has fall, awards season release all over it and should’ve been released in November. To give you an idea of how limited – it’s only playing in one theater in Los Angeles. It had such advanced buzz here, a two o’clock showing was nearly sold out in a large theater. The ladies next to us, both older, had driven two hours to see the movie and were raving about it afterward, saying it was worth the drive.

That’s a good movie.

So, one of the great television shows ended last Sunday night. Yes, it’s time we tackled the  LOST finale here at Guided By Wire. I do promise this – if you’re not a fan and don’t plan on watching it, that’s fine. I understand. I may think you’re really cheating yourself out of some prime entertainment, but I promise not to make fun of you. Well, not too much at least.

The finale last Sunday was some serious event television. With a recap, two hour special before the two and a half hour final episode, it was an epic evening of television. The likes of which we don’t really see much of anymore. The last time I recall such a big deal being made out of the end of a television show was SEINFELD. I know several iconic shows have ended since then, but they didn’t seem to rise about the usual chatter and galvanize fans and non-fans alike to watch. That’s what makes it an event. For LOST, they were not on their normal night and commanded the whole primetime block for the evening and late night as well (Jimmy Kimmel special after.). That screams event to me.

Why all the hullabaloo? Well, LOST was the last of a dying breed of shows. Sure, it had its hard core fans (LOSTIES) and it had been at for six years, featured a talented cast and had plenty of mystery going on week to week (some would say too much, but I would say to them never!) What’s this business about last of a dying breed? Well, LOST was epic. Unrepentantly epic, actually, with its sprawling cast and story lines, it’s Feature like attention to set design and cinematography, the pathological willingness of the writers to constantly push and play with the world they built from the pilot form, until it didn’t resemble itself (An island that travels through time?!?!) The production shot in Hawaii and didn’t shy away from featuring the undeveloped vistas play a role. Also, the score. The amazing, Feature like score that was crafted for different episodes and for the show as a whole. In fact, you could say when LOST was firing on all cylinders, we were getting a movie a week on Television and it was a gripping movie that get us on the edge of our seat. We probably won’t ever see that type of show – the epic, almost movie-like, sprawling, multi-threaded (different ongoing storylines instead of self-contained) one-hour drama – on television again. A show of that nature is a trying undertaking and in today’s humbled economy, as well as broadcasting’s splintered, specialized market, a show of LOST’S scope and cost doesn’t make much sense. You never know, but I would be surprised.

Many, many different threads were begun by the writers through the six seasons. A lot of the build-up through this season was, of course, all about the “answers.” How many would we get? We couldn’t possibly get them all, could we? What was important? What wasn’t? And on and on. This season, admittedly, buckled under all that build-up. It was unwieldy at first as a whole new thread, important to the Finale (which we didn’t understand at the time), was developed and the answers were given sporadically and not in the most dramatic fashion, more as an afterthought at times. That’s okay. It happens. They had a heck of a job to do, overall, and I think they did the best they could, in the end.  There’s been plenty of debate among LOSTIES and even NON-LOSTIES this week over the Finale, the choices made, the narrative path taken, and all that was left unanswered. Part of the struggle in this debate has stemmed, in my opinion, from making sense of the Finale in the context of all that came before it, essentially fitting it in as the last piece of a puzzle, and making sense of the new world threaded in this season and played out in the Finale. There’s been many theories trying to explain what happened and why. The best, or at least most concise and fun one that I’ve seen so far, is embedded below:

BE FOREWARNED: MAJOR SPOILERS!

Yes, LOST explained with post-it notes in about three minutes. And, he’s right, basically. He nails the core story and lays it out with great clarity. What I love though, is what he says at the very end.

“For me LOST isn’t a show that’s about the story, but a show about how the story is told.”

That is it. Right to the heart of it. With LOST and its Finale, as well as many other shows, what we love is how the story is told; or what we should love and become fans of is how the story is told. If your a LAW & ORDER fan, which ended its run this past week after twenty-one seasons on the air, you know what I mean. That’s another great example. They say in all storytelling there’s only six stories and what captivates us as audiences, what has captivated us from the fire light on the cave wall to the plasma glowing in the dark, is how those six stories are told. The LOST writers made a definite choice in the Finale to focus on how they would tell that last episode’s story, and subsequently through that choice, how they would tell the story of the series. Upon reflection, through this prism, it was a master class on storytelling. The Finale was completely satisfying in an emotional context, which is the choice that the writers made – emotion was the frame chosen to display their work over the past six seasons and it was an excellent choice because it made everything feel complete, it made us feel connected one last time to this strange world and these characters on their mind-bending journey. That’s no small feat – to make us care all the way to the final shots in over a hundred hours of storytelling. And that’s exactly what they did – by focusing on how to tell the story and not worrying about the story so much. Bravo and thank you, to the writers of LOST and this gentleman with his post-its and YouTube video, opening my eyes to the power of this principle.

Welcome to the back half of the week.

A shout out, first of all, to my dear friend Monique, wife of my other dear friend Mike. Both hail back to the Marquette days and are two of my most favorite people on the planet. That have a beautiful family on the east coast. Monique was also in graduate school as well. We were mirrors of each other. That is until monday, when Monique graduated! So congrats, Mo!! And to all the Howley’s! I know we don’t quite celebrate like we used to at the Love Apt’s or Roseneath, but I’m sure you guys acknowledged the momentous occasion in fine style.

I’m do back, pounding away on the script Jason and I are working hard to finish as soon as possible. Initially, I thought I wouldn’t post, but then figured the warm-up would do me well before I dove back in for the final lap of the evening. It’s been a long forty-eight hours, with the brunt of the work coming today. Much as I mentioned last night, I faired the same today – no so hot. It was a game of inches when I was looking for a blow out. What can you do? Keep going, that’s what. It eventually turns around. Late tonight I started to feel it rumbling towards take-off, thus this last lap. Usually if I’m struggling and I put in the hours I did today, I’d drop it for the night, come back in the morning, attack it again. What I feel like the writer is always trying to conjure, induce, cultivate, amplify, stoke, cook, construct is a certain magnetism to the project at hand. A kind of low humming, constant gravitational pull. The bits, voices and scenes are flashing through your head, story knots are being unwound by the diligent, tireless fingers in your subconscious, and your mumbling under your breath – chasing the rhythm and cadence of your characters’ voices, trying them on, tailoring them as you go and then loading them into your hands and your mind’s eye.

That’s why it’s tough – this magnetism – to switch gears quickly from one project to another. That’s what I’ve been feeling a bit lately. Many writers will not switch gears between projects like that. It’s one at a time. Jason and I separately, and now together, have had a habit of juggling many projects at UCLA. But that’s more out of drive, wonder, and need, mostly. In time we became accustomed to it. I don’t know if I, or Jason for that matter, would prefer that the workload ease off a bit or calm down to a one project at a time kind of thing. I don’t think we could go back to that. I once said that without thinking to my Therapist – retiring to Italy and not writing. Her reaction? She laughed out loud. Like surprised laughter she found it so absurd. Not the Italy part. The not writing part.

Well I’ve gone off on a tangent and completely gotten away from my simple post. Oh, well. Suffice to say, the magnetism is hard to get going, but when it does, there’s nothing like it. If it’s not happening, all you can do it keep tending to the just planted crops, waiting for them to shoot up out of the ground. All work will be repaid, eventually!

So, here’s a few simple quotes I found on the internet. They’re for screenwriting, but I think they apply to any craftsman. Hope they’re at least enjoyable to mull over. They’re great reminders for me of some of the fundamentals.

“Writing really is a process of discovery. The biggest enemy is being satisfied. When I think, ‘Oh, this is so great. They can’t change a word. They’ve got to film it exactly like this,’ that’s when I know I’m not pushing hard enough. That’s when you have to be most suspicious.”

-William Broyles, Jr. (Apollo 13, Cast Away, The Polar Express)

“Guilt drives me. I know I have to write every day. During the story period, it’s so much harder, it’s much more fluid… When I start to write, I give myself a goal of five pages a day. I don’t stop until I get that done, whether it’s taken me two hours or twelve. Sometimes if I get rolling I can write more, I can write ten pages… It makes you push. Because otherwise, you’d come to the tough part two pages in and you’d go, I’m gonna give up. You have to push through. Because with every scene you come to, you know that the last scene was easy to write, but this scene is impossible. And you get through that, and you see the next scene, and you say, that last one was easy to write, but this one’s impossible. Every single scene is usually like that. Always, impossible. And then the characters start talking to you.”

Paul Haggis (Crash, Million Dollar Baby)

“One thing that has proven to be true for us [Kurtzman & Orci] over and over again is not to be married to our words, necessarily, but to be married to the spirit of the words. Because there’s a thousand ways you can express an idea.”

– Alex Kurtzman (Mission Impossible 3, Star Trek)

“The writing is the easiest part of it. The trying period is the period of conceptualization, followed by research. This prewriting time can take anywhere from six months to ten years. But once I know everything there is to know about my characters, the actual writing of the script switches to automatic pilot. It makes no difference whether the script is for TV or feature–the writing period is the same: five pages a day, seven days a week. That’s it. Nothing magical. You just sit there and keep typing.”

– Stirling Silliphant (In the Heat of the Night, Charly, The Poseidon Adventure)

“You must write everyday. Free yourself. Free association. An hour alone a day. Blind writing. Write in the dark. Don’t think about what it is you’re writing. Just put a piece of paper in the typewriter, take your clothes off and go! No destination… pay it no attention… it’s pure unconscious exercise. Pages of it. Keep it up until embarrassment disappears. Eliminate resistance. Look at it in the morning. Amazing sometimes. Most of it won’t make any sense. But there’ll always be a small kernel of truth that relates to what you’re working on at the time. You won’t even know you created it. It will appear, and it is yours. Pure gold, a product of that pure part of you that does not know how to resist.”

– Alvin Sargent (Paper Moon, Julia, Ordinary People)

“Forget every rule any screenwriting guru ever taught you. Except one: Never be boring.”

– David Mamet (The Verdict, The Untouchables, Hoffa)

Good Night. Good Day. God Speed. I hope you’re smiling wherever you are. I’ll be at the keyboard.

Every Tuesday & Thursday this month, on Turner Classic Movie Channel, my playwriting professor, Hanay Geiogamah, is joining host Robert Osborne for a special series of films that Hannay curated for TCM and provides commentary before and after with Osborne and a select few Native American actors and filmmakers. The series is called RACE IN HOLLYWOOD: NATIVE AMERICAN IMAGES ON FILM. It’s a pretty mainstream look at Native American portrayals in cinema, starting of course with John Ford and Stagecoach and go from there. Each week there’s a different topic. The series covers some thirty films and about eight decades of films in and out of Hollywood. Plenty of classics are included like The Searchers, Little Big Man, Dances With Wolves, Last of the Mohicans, Northwest Passage, Black Robe, and One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest. There’s also some rare titles thrown in, one in particular The Exiles, which was an award winning restoration project of the UCLA Film Archive when I worked there. The film is a documentary-narrative hybrid about a lost L.A. neighborhood Bunker Hill, which was where many Native Americans settled after WWII, in one of the bigger exodus from reservation life.

Hanay is, as I have mentioned on here before, one of my most favorite professors at UCLA. I have had the gift of studying playwriting with him for the better part of a year and it has been wonderful. He’s extremely intelligent, an eloquent speaker with a quick mind, but not pretentious in the least – that is a rare combination. He’s a definite academic – through and through – as well as the preeminent Native American playwright, director, and choreographer of the last half century, director of the American Indian Studies Center @ UCLA, Managing Editor of The American Indian Culture and Research Journal, artistic director for the Native American Dance Theater and The Native American Theater Ensemble,  a film producer (TNT’s Geronimo, Tecumseh: The Last Warrior, and Crazy Horse)  and a celebrated historian. Whew! As an academic, that’s the kind of resume I’d like to have – far reaching and respected. Hanay also loves to tell stories and he’s lead quite a life, so he has plenty to tell.  You should tune in one of these Tuesday nights just to catch a bit of him before or after the movies. He’s always worth it in my book, if nothing else because he’s such a great guy and a true character.  Of course definitely check out some of the films. At least watch One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest. There’s a few video clips on the site as well, which you can link to by clicking on the “RACE IN HOLLYWOOD..” above. I would post them here, but I can’t seem to figure that out!

Enjoy!

Sad news today in Hollywood. I’m sure some of you may have seen the headlines. Dennis Hopper, one of the American Film Industries enduring, wildest icons – as well as one of my most favorite actors, is near death after battling cancer for the past year. This has surfaced because Hopper is due to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame tomorrow in front of the aging movie palace, The Egyptian Theater. His longtime lawyer released a statement to the press that it may very well be Hopper’s last appearance in public.

Dennis Hopper’s career encompasses an incredible amount of American film history. He was at ground zero, or collaborated with, many groundbreaking artists. His career began in 1955, at the age of nineteen. Along with the dearly departed Paul Newman, Hopper represents a link to the exalted past of the studio system – the contract player. He began on television in that first golden age of the medium and segued into supporting roles, most notably, Rebel Without A Cause and Giant with his good friend and running buddy, James Dean. He was deeply affected by Dean’s sudden death and soon began his long plunge off the deep end. This would be his first career implosion, which would lead to a prominent second career as a photographer and painter, among other things (He was a celebrated art collector for most of his life.) He spent most of the early sixties, studying with Lee Strasburg (Al Pacino, Dustin Hoffman, Sally Field, Sidney Poitier, Marlon Brando, and many, many others all studied under him)  - the famed acting teacher – in New York because he was persona non grata in Hollywood.

Eventually, of course, Hopper returned – just as the old studio system was crumbling and the young method actors, trained in New York on the stage and in live television, were starting to take over Hollywood with Bonnie and Clyde, as well as The Graduate. This would all reach an explosive head with the Dennis Hopper/Peter Fonda zeitgeist Easy Rider in 1969, which ushered in the second Golden Age of American Cinema – the 70′s and the film school brats. With the explosive success of Easy Rider, Coppola, Altman, Scorcese, Friedkin, and a host of other geniuses found a studio system desperate for their youth and vitality. Of course, Hopper’s sudden immense success, as well as the blossoming counter-culture would lead to his second, and last, career implosion. This one, though, would take almost a decade and a half to unravel and would cement the maniac, insane mythos around the man for the rest of his life. If you ever want to see Dennis Hopper playing the drug addled, insane Dennis Hopper of this period in his life, look no further than his unsettling performance in Coppola’s Apocalypse Now. In fact, take it one step further and see the brilliant making of documentary Hearts of Darkness – A Filmmaker’s Apocalypse. You will see that cameras rolling or not, that wasn’t a performance by Hopper, but rather him, as is, running around the set in the midst of the movie being made.

This flame out ended in spectacular fashion in 1983, six full years after Apocalypse Now, when Hopper disappeared on an epic binge in the Mexican desert and was believed to be dead. He instead finally hit bottom and entered rehab, where he would begin a nearly two year struggle to get and stay sober. He was essentially uninsurable on a film set at that time – the kiss of death for an Actor. He was too big of a risk – whether he would die or not – that an insurance company would not provide insurance if he was cast in a film. Basically, the only other actor I know of to reach that level is Robert Downey, Jr. Dennis Hopper did get sober though and returned to acting in 1986 with the stunning troika of pictures – Hoosiers, Blue Velvet, and The River’s Edge. All in one incredible year! To me, it might very well represent the most epic, unbelievable come back in the history of Film. Here’s what he had to say in a Hollywood Reporter interview about that magical year:

“My first year of sobriety. I did them all back to back. I shot “Blue Velvet” in Wilmington, went straight to Indianapolis and started “Hoosiers.” When I got to L.A., I did “River’s Edge.” Now, of those three films, I like the one that didn’t get any play — “River’s Edge.” It wasn’t because I had a better part, because I didn’t; I just thought it was a really interesting movie.”

From there he would go on to star in Speed, Red Rock West, Waterworld, Jesus’ Son, Super Mario Bros., and to direct Colors, among countless others. He was most recently seen in the TV adaptation of Crash and the film Elegy. He was truly a raconteur, an original, who’s talent couldn’t be kept down and manifested itself in many different way – not just acting. Check out his evolution in the photos below.

doc

In Giant, James Dean's last film

With Peter Fonda (Cpt. America Helmet) and a young Jack Nicholson (gold helmet) in the seminal Easy Rider

Insanity in the jungle in Coppola's Apocalypse Now

As the twisted villain, Frank Booth in David Lynch's Blue Velvet

The aging icon two years ago at the Cannes Film Festival