Even without Mickey Rourke! "I remember meeting with a studio executive after he saw the movie and he said, 'You have a lot to learn about editing.' I said 'I’m sure I do, give me an example.' He brought up the roast beef sandwich scene. 'Well you’re going on and on with, "Are you gonna eat the sandwich, not eat the sandwich," just cut it and get on with the story.' I said, 'Well, that is the story.' It’s a way to talk about friendship. A lot of time you see movies and people are talking about, 'How long have we been friends?' Friends don’t talk about being friends. From the nature of their conversation, you know they’re friends. That was the point. We talk about problems with girlfriends in abstract ways, we get off the point, we get into arguments that are not essential to what the argument is really about. We’re always messy. That, really was the point of Diner." [Baltimore Magazine via The Awl]
Happy Thanksgiving, my naughty little puritans. Before I jump headfirst into the HoKa turkey that Gloria Virtel is graciously preparing, I thought I'd share the five filmic things I'm most thankful for in 2011. Join me as I thank national treasures like Jon Hamm, Penn Badgley, and Twitter's new empress.
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In his debut feature Another Happy Day, director Sam Levinson (yep, Barry's son) worked with a cast including actors who've been legends since before he was born in 1985: Ellen Barkin, Ellen Burstyn, George Kennedy, Demi Moore, Thomas Haden Church, and newcomer Ezra Miller play stubborn, dysfunctional family members who bicker, spar, and essentially fail to communicate at a tumultuous wedding. Levinson garnered the 2011 Sundance Film Festival Waldo Salt screenwriting award for penning Another Happy Day, and -- like Barkin on Twitter -- is proving himself to be a fearsome, perceptive, and honest voice. We phoned Levinson to discuss his father's influence, why he screened Carnal Knowledge for his cast and crew, and Ellen Barkin's amazing candor.
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Imagine Rachel Getting Married, but instead of one emotionally unpredictable family member silently threatening to upset a family wedding, there are multiple. Enter Another Happy Day, the directorial debut of Sam Levinson (son of Barry) which features Ellen Barkin in a juicy comeback role as the volatile mother of the groom, Ellen Burstyn as her mother, Thomas Haden Church as her ex, Demi Moore as her ex's new wife, recent Verge designee Ezra Miller as her drug addict son and Kate Bosworth as her cutter daughter. If your head's not yet spinning, click ahead to see the family member-on-family member emotional crimes on display in the trailer for the messy matrimonial movie event of the year.
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