James Franco has been an Academy Award nominee for a little less than two hours now, but he's already fired his first shot across the bows of The Social Network and other "classically made" but utterly conventional Hollywood offerings -- Oscar front-runners or not. And he let it rip exclusively in conversation with Movieline.
"I know I'm biased; I think it's the most innovative movie this year," Franco said in an interview at the ongoing Sundance Film Festival. "Look, Social Network is about new technology and how people are communicating now? Or it's supposed to be? They don't deal with any of that! It's a very classically structured movie and classically made movie. 127 Hours is about a guy -- one single character in a single place. That is like the cutting edge of moviemaking. Short of, like, doing it in 3-D or something. [...] I think the movie's perfect. The fact that people are scared shows they just want the old. They want more of the old, boring stuff."
And the rest, as discussed with Movieline's Elvis Mitchell:
What do you mean by 'old, boring stuff'?
People sitting around talking. And then, like, car chases. A couple love stories? I've seen, like, three love stories here at Sundance. Traditional love stories!
And?
It's the same old! [Laughs]
So you're saying people don't like new stuff?
Two white people... How many time have you seen the story where two white people can't be together? How many times have you seen that story? Romeo and Juliet! It's 400 years old!
That's why I stay away from that story; I've seen that story way too many times.
Yeah. I mean, they're well made movies, but the story itself...
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More from Movieline's complete Sundance coverage at the Dockers House sponsored by Java Monster here.