I caught the new film Kiss Kiss Bang Bang the other night. This is screenwriter Shane Black’s (Lethal Weapon, The Last Boy Scout, The Long Kiss Goodnight) directorial debut and the first film produced from his script in over a decade. It’s really a great film; more humor and satire than action, but Robert Downey Jr. is in top form as a criminal cum would-be actor and Val Kilmer plays well here as a smooth and very gay (but not laughably gay) private detective that is supposed to show Downey’s character how to play the part. It’s really a self-mocking film that exists as much to make fun of this type of film, and the narration alone (“Oh fuck, I forgot that scene…can I say fuck?”) alone makes the film worth watching. Think Scream for the film noir genre, but smarter. Even the opening titles are brilliant. (I could do without Downey singing over the end credits, though.) You don’t have to be a film nerd or a detective novel reader to get amusement from it, I think, but if you are then you’ll recognize a lot of the in-jokes.
Anyway, great film, go see it…except you probably can’t. It was released a couple of weeks ago…on 8 bloody screens. They’ve presumably expanded the release somewhat, but on the second weekend of release it is showing a cool $580k against a $15M budget, no doubt in part because it’s been scarcely promoted or made available. This is yet another example of Warner Independent pictures seemingly not interested in actually, you know, distributing films. They fucked Spartan last year, which was admittedly not going to be a breakout hit film (too dark, too subtly intelligent, too Mamet), but it certainly could have done better than the paltry $4.5M it cleared on the few dozen screens it appeared on. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang pulled in over a million in France on its opening weekend there, which is a quite respectable cut, and there’s no reason to think that with a little bit of promotion it couldn’t easily recoup its vig in the States. But I’m guessing it won’t. The irony is in the end, the narrator apologizes to people in the midwest for using the word “fuck” so much, but unless they’re visiting New York or Los Angeles, they’ll probably never have the opportunity to accept the apology.
More of a rant than a Cafe Society discussion, I suppose, but if you get the chance and you like noir/detective films, check it out. It’s probably the best reworking of the genre since Blood Simple, and with a lot of humor besides (albeit some of it kind of sadistic). Heck, just check it out for the opening titles.
Or go and see the latest Harry Potter snorefest…it’s your ten clams, I suppose.
Luckily, this movie is opening in wide release tomorrow (November 11th), and I am STOKED. I am a HUGE Shane Black fan, after the Lethal Weapon quartet (yes, even the third one), The Last Boy Scout, The Long Kiss Goodnight, and even Predator (where Black played the bespectacled Hawkins, the commando who kept making pussy jokes). I love action-buddy-comedies, detective stories, and film noir, and this movie sounds tailor-made for me – plus Downey and Kilmer are usually very good. I’m expecting it to be in my Top Five favorites of the year! (Then again, I am also looking forward to Harry Potter IV.)
Was Spartan good? It didn’t stick around in theaters long at all, but it seems worthy of a rental.
I’m seeing this on Sunday. I’ve been excited to see it since the early buzz broke a couple of months ago.
But I’ll agree: I’ve made a point of following the film. I haven’t seen one iota of promotion outside my own efforts. If the movie’s as much fun as I expect it to be, I’ll be flummoxed yet again at how a studio (even a faux ministudio) is incapable of selling something even slightly outside the mainstream model.
I want to see this movie and Harry Potter, thankyouverymuch.
But “gay” movies are always a longshot, especially in a country where on Tuesday Texas voted overwhelming support to a constitutional ban on gay marriage. Warner doesn’t want to create a shitstorm with a movie that will probably have more dissenters than viewers. Sad state, and it’s unfortunate that Warner is covering their ass instead of actually challenging peoples’ perceptions of homosexuality, opening their minds a little. I expect much the same will happen for Brokeback Mountain. IIRC, much the same happened for Boys Don’t Cry until it did something pesky like get nominated for a boatload of Oscars. So it’s getting released in only a few big city theaters, as they have shown themselves to be the only areas mature enough to handle homosexuality.
Yup. Released October 10 1999 on two screens, and its max was 365 screens a mere six months later, weekend of April 2 2000 (the Oscars were aired March 26 2000).
And I was wrong about “boatload.” Just two Oscars noms, but one was the Best Actress winner.
I hope so. Val Kilmer’s character was loosely based on a guy I know (and he was the military/tech advisor), so I am going to rent it.
I just found out the above info, otherwise I would have found it during the theatrical release, in case you’re wondering.
If you love a director, writer, or star, you must support them on the opening weekend whenever you can. Those numbers will determine whether a film goes wide. Spike Lee has been harping on this for years- if you’re going to support a “black” film, you had better do it on the opening weekend.
This opened here yesterday. Even the artiest, fartiest reviewers have raved about it so I think I will catch it this weekned.
Here is a quick taste:
A murder mystery a la Raymond Chandler meets the odd couple in this blackly hilarious bravado film that goes further in self-referentialism than anything ever seen before.
It’s appearing in one (1) theater locally. Except for the oddest foreign films at the art theater, no commercial film ever opens in just one (1) theater. Bizarre beyond belief.
I liked Spartan, but I’m an unabashed fan of Mamet (well, sometimes…I could have done without Oleanna, though) and I like the stylized dialog and the “subversion of genre conventions by exploiting them” approach that Mamet applies. If you liked The Spanish Prisoner, then you’ll like Spartan–it’s a more interesting film than the somewhat generic Heist, but not as good as House of Games. It certainly didn’t get anything like the promotion it deserved.
The thing is, while one of the protagonists is gay (and for the slash fans there’s a couple of scenes of Kilmer-on-Downey action, albeit they end with Downey sputtering and complaining that “these detective lessons suck!”), the homosexuality isn’t a real issue; this isn’t The Dying Gaul or Brokeback Mountain; Black plays the gay character for laughs, although in a way that (I think) is respectful and isn’t patronizing or offensive. Kilmer’s detective just happens to be gay, but he’s not a Birdcage-flaunting and flaming faggot, he just…likes guys. “Still gay?” Downey asks him; “No, I’m neck deep in pussy, I just like the name.”
The movie is actually broken into chapters that are named after Raymond Chandler novels (The Lady In The Lake, Farewell, My Lovely, et cetera) and Downey’s character is apologetic that he’s not a better organized narrator. It’s not quite as self-referential as, say, Adaptation, but it is aware that it’s just a film and it reminds you of that any time you try to take it too seriously. There’s one great scene in the end…but I’m not going to ruin it for you. Good flick, go see it, tell your friends about it, et cetera. I just can’t believe that WIP is doing jack shit to promote it, while at the same time (like every other big studio) complaining that they aren’t clearing a profit on their $100M movies. There’s a market for intelligent, plot-driven films with real characters and minimum special effects, and if they studio execs can’t figure that out then they deserve to sink themselves; it’s just a pity that they drag other good films along with them into the mire.
And some people are turning off to the WNBA because Lisa Leslie announced that ::gasp:: she’s a lesbian. (There’s currently a pit thread on the subject)
There’s always the annoying/amusing story of a woman in the office where my fiancee was interning one summer, when Finding Nemo was in theaters. The woman would not take her son to see the movie because Ellen Degeneres provided a major character’s voice, and her influence might rub off on the poor child. That’s right, if that boy had seen the movie, he might have become A FISH!
These people are out there, and in larger numbers than we want to believe.
I agree with everything the OP said about this movie. GO SEE IT! It’s smart, clever, funny and fascinating. My husband and I both loved it.
It’s not a “gay” movie, for heaven sakes. One of the lead characters is gay and there are a few offhand gay-centric jokes. People who have problems with a gay-friendly movie are too stupid to get the rest of the movie anyway.
I hope the movie does reasonably well, so Shane Black can make more movies. It’s not just a distribution problem though. It’s a problem with people actually getting out to go see these movies. When I think of some of the excellent films that have died recently (like Duma and The Great Raid, I want to smack people who say that movies nowadays suck.
We’re also proud fans of The Last Action Hero, which was a satire of action films. People just didn’t get it. Most action fans were perplexed by the humor and hated it, and people who would have gotten that it was supposed to be a satire stayed away in droves because it was, seemingly, an Ahnold action flick.
Btw Stranger, I’ve seen Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and it’s not a snorefest (neither was the fantastic Prisoner of Azkaban) and in fact, we have tickets to the midnight show next week. I liked GoF so much it got me to finally read the books, after I’d been ignoring them all these years. There’s no reason why a person can’t enjoy both types of movies.
I happen to be a big fan of Hudson Hawk, touted as one of the biggest bombs of the '90s. Again, it was horribly mismarketed, and most people just didn’t get it. I think they went in expecting Batman-Lite, an action movie with a dashing hero swinging around on wires. Instead, it was a comedy, and a hilariously weird one at that. If people went in without any expectations at all, or without having seen the trailers and commercials… nah, they still probably wouldn’t like it.
And don’t get me started on defending The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension!
I haven’t seen Hudson Hawk but I intend to see it. However, The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension needs NO defending. It’s wonderful!
Chaplin is an amazing movie, and Downey’s best work ever.
But I just got back from Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, and damn, everyone was right. I loved everything about it, every moment, every word of dialogue. It will definitely be in my Top Five Movies of 2005, even with two months left to go in the year. This was a movie perfectly made for my sensibilites as a film noir and action-buddy-comedy fan, and I highly recommend it to anyone who likes that sort of thing.
