Pete Postlethwaite (1946-2011)
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Aaron Sorkin Is A Dick
Recently followed this link from the IMDb, which includes some truly precious quotes:
I have considerably more power as an individual than I do as a member of that group, and I am forced to be a member of that union in order to work. Moreover, because the vast majority of the members of that union are not employed, frankly, the Writers Guild works best as an organization not to protect writers from management but to protect people who want to be writers from people who already are. I have never had any trouble with a studio, with a network, with a producer, with a director, with a star; I have only ever had trouble with the Writers Guild.
Translation: “I am the biggest writer who ever was! And because I am so successful, and obviously a perfect writer, everyone who is not successful must be a failure and a bad writer. The studios love me for writing superficial ‘zingy’ scripts with little reference to the complexities of the real world, so I think it’s terrible if I have to make even the tiniest of sacrifices for other people who may not be as rich as I.
I’m also one of the 9 percent of the Writers Guild who did not vote to support the strike. By the way, I now will not get a WGA nomination, we can rule that out. [Laughs.] It’s not a coincidence that it’s roughly that 9 percent of people who are employed.
Translation: “Everyone who disagrees with me on this is an unemployed hobo hack.”
My feeling is if you want to get the extra three cents on the streaming video — frankly, I never even understood the issue behind the strike because I don’t know anything about technology — if you want to get the extra three cents, write better. Your agent will get it for you. Be good, be in demand [and] your agent will get it! Let the markets work!
Translation: “I make so much money that I don’t give a shit about anyone else. Why don’t they eat cake? And that technology stuff, I don’t know what it’s good for, but I’m sure it will not play any part in writer’s lives in the future. And even if it did, the multibillion-dollar corporations that run the business aren’t really out for profit… they just want to help you! They believe in fair play and niceness, because that way everyone gets what they want! No, we don’t need any safeguards against unethical behaviour, because we know that big industry never behaves unethically.”
Well-said, you overpaid sellout prick.
Updates and other news
As you may have noticed, updates here at Commentarium have lately (or perhaps always) come in bursts. One of the reasons for that is that we’re working on several big projects; the other is that we would rather provide you with interesting content than with generic nonsense or information and gossip reposted from the IMDb.
These gaps can, however, become a little too large, and it would be silly to pretend that the only thing that’s interesting on the internet is our articles. So we will try to post interesting links or shorter articles every now and then, but only when something is genuinely noteworthy or fascinating. Feel free to send us suggestions!
Another thing we’d like to do is support independent filmmakers. We know all too well how difficult it is to be an indie – we’re in that situation ourselves, and in multiple artforms at that. Any tiny bit of exposure helps, even if only in the form of encouragement. That does not mean we’ll be promoting any indie material that comes our way, no matter how bad; but we’ll gladly watch anything people have to offer, and do interviews and the like. Again, suggestions or queries are very welcome. We’re nice and approachable and not particularly pretentious.
Finally, note that RSS feeds of Commentarium are available in the sidebar menu – they weren’t there when we first changed themes, but we have been reminded that people use them and have thus put them back where they belong. Enjoy!
Coming Up
It’s been quiet here at Commentarium for a few days, as we were both very busy with major creative projects – Verena finished typing the novel she’s been working on, and Jonas is getting close to releasing his new computer game. We’ve still been seeing a lot of movies, however, and have several interesting articles coming up.
Stay tuned!
Oscar Burnout
Staying up all night to watch the Oscars was fun, but a bit much; it’s taken us a while to recover, especially since there was a lot to do in the last few days. But we’ll start posting articles again tomorrow: two reviews of Alice in Wonderland, one of Shutter Island, and some thoughts on the Oscars.
@CommentariumNet and the Oscars
We’ll be watching the Academy Awards tonight and posting our comments live on Twitter.
Let’s hope this year’s show will be fun and Avatar wins some decent awards. There’s other great movies, too – District 9, The Hurt Locker, Up, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus and a few others. As long as they don’t give anything to Tarantino, we’ll be happy.
Feel free to share your thoughts and comments, here or on Twitter.
Welcome to Commentarium
Hello there!
We’d like to welcome you to Commentarium.net, a new website dedicated to the arts of cinema and television. Commentarium is a website/blog for all those of you who, like us, are still enthusiastic about the moving image, who get excited about new movies, and don’t thoughtlessly buy into the bitching and hating that often follows the release of a hotly-anticipated movie. Commentarium is for those of you who enjoy thinking and talking and joking about movies.
Commentarium isn’t fashionably cynical. Commentarium doesn’t hate Hollywood. Commentarium has a sense of humor.
What can you expect from Commentarium? Well, here’s a list:
- Reviews. Some funny, some analytical, some both. Always written with enthusiasm for the form, if not for the results.
- Commentary. From storytelling trends to the latest developments in filmmaking to the injustice of the Oscars, our thoughts on what’s going on in the world of film and TV.
- Analysis. Sometimes you need to dig deeper into a film or series to get more out of it. We love that.
- Damn Sneerers! Named after a quotation of William Blake’s, this series of articles will focus on those films and series that have been unjustly attacked by the critics and then buried by the thoughtless repetition of half-baked ideas.
- Lists. Top tens, top fives… lists are fun and informative, as long as you don’t take them too seriously.
- Guest Articles. Interesting thoughts and positions by guest writers.
- Podcasts. Because some more discussions are just more fun when you can hear people talk.
- And much more! It sounds like a terrible cliché, but it’s true. We have more ideas, and will let you know about these when the time is right.
Feel free to leave a comment and say hi. If you enjoy our articles, we’ll appreciate any support we can get: from sharing an article on Facebook or Twitter to a small donation. By the way: we promise never to bother you with ads or any such nonsense. We’re here for the stories; let’s have fun.