In Contention

Tag: Jody Hill

  • “Listen you f***ers you screwheads…”

    I was watching some special on “Eastbound & Down” recently where one of the producers (might have been Will Ferrell, or maybe it was David Green) was talking about how the show is a commentary on the state of the hero in pop culture.  Then I heard the talk out of SXSW about “Observe and Report,” Joe Leydon’s review, for instance, indicating transgression and the idea of capturing the film’s essence in four words: “Travis Bickle: Mall Cop.”

    More and more I dig what this crew (Jody Hill, Green, Seth Rogen, etc.) is doing with comedy on the screen and forgive me, but I think Jeff Wells is missing the purposeful irony of a tag line like “Right now, the world needs a hero.”  Given the perspective Hill and company have on protagonists on the small screen, I think this is more than just an arbitrary Warner Bros. marketing decision.

    I haven’t seen “Observe and Report,” but I’m catching a whiff of something truly special.

    Observe and Report advertisement in Times Square

  • The dawn of the journo Twitter apocalypse

    TwitterI was having lunch with a publicist recently who seemed to be totally confused at how Twitter was going to affect her job.  You know, someone sees a film, Twitters something about it off the cuff and suddenly there’s a conversation to be contained.

    My point of view is that there is nothing I can Tweet that I can’t go into my WordPress iPhone application and embellish a bit further and just as fast.  So the sudden boom of the Twitter culture seems like a big ole’ non-starter to me.  After all, speaking just for myself, I forget I have an account half the time.  And when it comes to work, like I said, I’d rather log in and post something here rather than offer up some quick line of “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” on another platform entirely.

    A friend recently wrote a piece for The Huffington Post on all this mess.  She stands by Twitter as a journalistic tool, but I can’t take that dive yet.  I think what we’re seeing is an industry struggling to stay hip, fresh and, above all, mobile.  So Twitter is just the flavor of the month (even though it’s been around forever).

    Then I saw Peter Sciretta over at /Film had put up a post called “Early Twitter Buzz: Observe and Report,” collecting the SXSW reactions to the film from folks like Film School Rejects’ Neil Miller, indieWIRE’s Matt Dentler and Cinematical’s James Rocchi, with some varied public reactions (I think) tossed in here and there.  Suddenly it seems my publicist friend’s nightmare might be a reality.

    Anyway, speaking of SXSW and “Observe and Report,” here’s part one of Anne Thompson’s interview with director Jody Hill (woo-hoo “Eastbound & Down!”) and actor Seth Rogen.  Head on over to Thompson on Hollywood for part two:

  • David Gordon Green catches his stride in comedy

    (from left) Danny McBride and David Gordon Green on the set of Eastbound & DownIt has to be doubly sweet for my southern brethren to take in HBO’s “Eastbound & Down” every Sunday night, but even if this country detail or that passes below your radar, or heck, even if you don’t know a blatant Ric Flair gag when you see one, I can’t imagine anyone not laughing their ass off at this thing week after week.

    Then again, maybe I’m wrong.  The Danny McBride brand of humor might be seen as an extension of the Apatow/Rogen trajectory we’ve been on, toilet humor a bit too low on the brow for some.  Not me.  I’m eating it up.

    Strikingly, I think the last three episodes (plus last year’s “Pineapple Express”) prove that David Gordon Green should stick to comedy and prepare to make his mark there, because this seems to be his calling.  I’m all for the era of artistic stretching he’s been interested in since “George Washington” leaped off the neighborhoods of North Carolina and onto Roger Ebert’s top 10 list, though 95% of all of that never worked for me.  And I’m sure he’ll go there once again.  But as long as he wants to stick in this vein, I’m game.

    Not only is the timing something special (and just take a look at the editorial choices made in “Pineapple” by flipping between the extended and theatrical cuts on the Blu-ray or DVD for evidence there), but the mundane is represented like never before.  Last July I wrote of “Pineapple” the following:

    Yes, the man who staked a claim on the mundane mumblings of children and the love-struck in films like “George Washington” and “All the Real Girls” has applied those sensibilities to a niche genre that roots itself in same.

    And it works! It works so well it’s a shame Terrence Malick never tried his hand at “Up in Smoke.” The pieces slide into place and find a cohesive fit that couldn’t have been more unexpected.

    And that’s the case with “Eastbound & Down.”  100%.

    Of course, plenty of credit is due to co-creators McBride and Jody Hill (directing this summer’s “Observe and Report”), but the guidance behind the camera is exceptional.  I only hope I’m not the only guy taking this stuff for more than surface level, however, because it deserves more — whether it knows it or not.

    (And hel-lo Katy Mixon.)