Hollywood

In 2003, the Scottish comic book writer Mark Millar penned a three-part illustrated series for DC Comics titled Red Son. In it, he creates an alternate Superman universe that hypothesizes what would have happened had the Kryptonian orphan’s rocket landed in Soviet-occupied Ukraine, instead of Kansas, in 1953. Superman becomes a state agent for Joseph Stalin’s Kremlin. Instead of saving the world in the name of “truth, justice and the American Way,” he fights as “the champion of the common worker,” for socialism and the expansion of the Warsaw Pact.

How should we assess the reputation of a late-career movie director? In the case of Roman Polanski, who turns ninety on August 18, we can clearly tick the box denoting a solid body of work. He’s responsible for half a dozen enduring films, and one — 2002’s The Pianist — that rightly won him an Academy Award. Readers may have their own candidate, but for me Polanski’s first full-length feature, 1962’s Knife in the Water, remains at the top of the list. It’s a beautifully crafted, if at times noticeably low-budget, thriller that offers the classic Polanskian brew of claustrophobia, latent menace, voyeurism, class antagonisms and sexual tension, in this case set aboard a small yacht.

Ask your average man on the street — or at least your average clued-up man with a decent knowledge of modern Hollywood — about the films of William Friedkin, who has died aged eighty-seven, and he will confidently sing the praises of Friedkin’s legendary pictures, The French Connection and The Exorcist. Then if he is pressed on the other eighteen films Friedkin directed, ranging from the excellent and underrated to the dismal, and a look of panic is likely to come over his face before he excuses himself and rushes into a nearby subway (or, if he is in New York, flees to an overground railway in homage to the legendary car chase scene in The French Connection). It is your choice whether you do a Popeye Doyle and head off in frantic pursuit, or leave him be.

If you saw the Barbie movie this week, chances are you enjoyed Michael Cera's performance as the long forgotten Allan doll. Cockburn must admit he doesn’t have much experience with kids’ toys (thanks to his lawyers, who fight paternity suits like pitbulls), but even he’s surprised at how lucrative a market the doll market is becoming. After its opening weekend, where Barbie raked in an estimated $155 million, now anyone with an Allan doll can make their own small fortune by selling it. Over the weekend, several eBay listings for old Allan dolls increased their prices. Before the film came out, some were priced as low as $30; now, the valuation has increased to over $300.  Since the movie's release, Allan has turned into a fan favorite.

The Barbenheimer phenomenon — thought of by many as just idle chatter on the internet — has enduring power. Last weekend, Barbie and Oppenheimer earned a combined $511 million in global box office receipts; an unprecedented number where neither film is a superhero picture or a sequel. Barbie made more money, on the grounds that it’s an hour shorter and is PG-13 rated, but the vast box office success of the R-rated Oppenheimer, which made over $170 million in its opening weekend, is testament both to Barbenheimer excitement, and to the film’s very own brand: its powerful writer-director-producer, Christopher Nolan.  James Cameron aside, it is hard to think of any filmmaker who wields such power and influence in contemporary Hollywood.

Christopher Nolan’s latest film, Oppenheimer, is about the second biggest bang in history. Yet at its London premiere on Thursday, there was another explosion that, in its own way, was no less seismic than anything put on screen. Its star-studded cast, including Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt, Matt Damon and Robert Downey Jr., assembled dutifully on the red carpet for interviews and selfies, but by the time that the film itself was about to screen, none of the actors were anywhere to be seen.  As Nolan said of his “incredible cast” in his introductory talk, “You’ve seen them here earlier on the red carpet.

Adam Devine, the star of the hit television series Workaholics and new Netflix movie The Out-Laws, recently gave some insight as to why comedies are hardly ever made by movie studios anymore. Devine appeared on the most recent episode of comedian Theo Von's podcast, This Past Weekend, where the pair discussed the downfall of comedy in movies. Devine, who also appeared in the Pitch Perfect series, surmised that high-budget superhero movies made comedies and other low-budget films less attractive to viewers spending money on theater tickets. He and Von also pointed out how movie executives try to force political and moral messages into their content — and that there is no longer "funny for funny's sake." "There's no hidden message," Devine said of his new movie.