Hey folks, Harry here... Tonight a pair of Frank Darabont production's websites went live. First let's take a gander at what is going on with Darabont's Third Directorial Endeavor... THE MAJESTIC. I first met Frank when he invited me out to Los Angeles to go on the set of THE GREEN MILE. Being a life long fan of Stephen King flicks, to find myself finally on the set of one... well, let's just say I was utterly delighted. Quite honestly, next to Peter Jackson's LORD OF THE RINGS set visit, THE GREEN MILE visit was my next fave. It didn't have the grandeur of say the FROM HELL set in Prague... Or the lavish expense of THE MUMMY sets, but having read THE GREEN MILE as each chapter came out... Watching the first time Coffey uses his healing powers in the film on Hanks' crotch... the lights sparking... Watching Mr Jingles do his thing... Talking with Hanks and Darabont about everything from Hollywood Gore to Internet Habitual Surfing to the perennial debates about which animation studio was our personal fave. Click Here To Read That Story... over 8000 stories ago!
THE MAJESTIC, first blipped on my radar as the Michael Sloane script... THE BIJOU. I read the script and was quite happy that the film was in Darabont's hands. Frank has a way of shooting his period films not as reality... but as we dream of the reality. And while the subject matter of the Red Scare and the Blacklist era of Hollywood is by no means something to feel all warm and fuzzy about... And certainly today it is everybit as timely as it was then... Just witness what has been happening to Bill Maher... Well, this film is very much about how the world of Hollywood, the realm of Politics and the events of the world may very well crash down upon you like a ton of bricks... but film... the movies.... picture shows, well they have a magic and an allure that never tarnishes and never dulls... This is a sonnet to films and the movie theater palaces of old. Over 2000 stories ago, Moriarty wrote about his visit to the Majestic set to behold the glory of Bruce Campbell playing a matinee idol of old in SAND PIRATES OF THE SAHARA, the film within the film!
Now the whole reason I'm writing this piece up is The Flash noticed that the MAJESTIC site had been launched, with a ton of pics (some of which you see here) over at this ere location!!! Now the site seems to be in Flash for no real substantial reason, other than making it difficult to capture pics... as right now there is no sound, no score.... No real animation... The marquee of the Majestic theater doesn't animate or buzz... There is literally no animation of significance, but it is flash anyways.... and non-scalable either.
However, the pics were nice. Back on the HTML page I noticed a secondary link to what seemed to be claiming was a production journal. I clicked on it and found myself reading the journals and thinking... Damn this is good... who wrote this? Turns out it was a fella by the name of Ernie Malick. He's a fella they call a Unit Publicist. Now, Unit Publicists are the folks that handle the local press in towns they're shooting in... they handle the 'visiting press' and usually their jobs entail giving you as little information as possible, if you are a member of the press. They are supposed to steer you away from anyone, who may be a known gossip or blabber... and if necessary, they're there to keep you away from actors that need 'their space'. They also go through all the on set photography picking the best stills and shots which will eventually wind up in press books... and they sometimes work with the subsequent Studio Publicity folks in crafting the 'selling of the completed film'.
Generally Unit Publicists are annoyed with me, because when I go to a set, typically it is a set that I've made myself familiar with in advance... I've read the script, I don't need them to explain what the scene is... I've read the scene and all the others... I know where this fits in, I've usually already heard the 'studio problems' and know if the actor in question is a 'I vant to be alone' type or not. But I liked Ernie. We were in the old Hollywood Warner lot, and he was telling me what all had shot in all the hangers... when he mentioned THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD, I nearly fainted. It (along with the original KING KONG) are my favorite two movies of all time... and I was standing where Flynn and Rathbone dueled. He definitely knew my buttons... and that's the history of these places... something that many of the Unit Publicists I've met over time are not intimate with.
The other thing I liked about Ernie, was he picked up on the vibe that I liked to just sit on an apple cart and WATCH THE FILMING... That I didn't need someone watching me all the time, that I wasn't the type to go schmooze and schmooze... but the type that would just sit and watch and if someone came over to talk... fine, we talk, but otherwise... I like to watch (Ever seen BODY DOUBLE?)
Well, if you Click Over To Ernie's Journal you will get a series of wonderful reports he's written from the set. And he is very extensive with the histories and coinciding events and trivia details... and it is very conversational and not really written in the typical publicist speak. Personally these are the sorts of reports that I'd love to see a film publish as the filming was commencing. Then you could read about the various twists and turns of production, while still having many of the spoilers preserved till you saw the film.
MEANWHILE...
The Flash also sent a note telling me that the trailer for THE SALTON SEA... a film that Frank Darabont produced... were now up!
Geeks At Large,
While running 'round the web at nigh the speed of light I thought I'd check out and see if Warner Bros. had, if anything, up for "The Salton Sea." Lo and behold it was active, at least partially. Upon further inspection I noticed they had the trailer stashed away, formatted in your household Apple super product, Quicktime...
Hi-Res (19.4 MB) http://saltonseamovie.warnerbros.com/dld/trailer_hi.mov
Med-Res (13.3 MB) http://saltonseamovie.warnerbros.com/dld/trailer_med.mov
Low-Res (6.9 MB) http://saltonseamovie.warnerbros.com/dld/trailer_lo.mov
This is no meteor gentleman!
Back to fightin' crime...
- The Flash
Now you might remember Mysterio's Original Review of this film way back in November of last year... Then there was that evil bastard Moriarty's Review which came out at the end of that month. It was quite ejaculatory, and revealed the rarest of birds recently... A fantastic Val Kilmer performance. Something that has been missing for a while now, and that I've been eager to discover on my own! So check out the trailer and count the days till... MARCH 15th when this baby FINALLY comes out!
