"‘I just didn’t recognise him!’ TikToker interviews Baz Luhrmann without knowing who he is – and they talk group sex."

The Guardian reports.

Ha ha ha. Why should she recognize him? Baz Luhrmann is quite famous, but he's not a famous face, and even when someone has a famous face, would you recognize that face if it turned up randomly on the street? You wouldn't know if you didn't. And how many times have you had to say, "Was that [name of celebrity]?" Ever been in the middle of a conversation with someone and had the sneaking suspicion that he thinks you're supposed to know he's somebody? Like Luhrmann in that video, most celebrities, I believe, would refrain from saying the dreaded words "Don't you know who I am?"

Anyway, it's a hilarious conversation. Luhrmann says something about marriage that the TikTokker, Georgia Godworth, paraphrases as “It’s a loose contract where you can fuck other people occasionally.” Luhrmann continues the conversation thoughtfully and politely. Watch the whole thing.

I went to a theater to see a movie for the first time in over a year.

It's been over a year since we went out to see a movie. We saw "Nomadland" in April 2021, and when we saw that it had been over a year since we'd gone out to see a movie. Covid has been part of these long gaps, but not all of it.

I'm not sure I will ever want to see a movie in the theater again. My #1 problem is that you are bound to sit through it. You can't pause. You can't walk away and come back later. That can be a positive. You've committed to sit through it and you almost certainly will. It's now or never.

Ha ha. Guess what move we saw? Yes, you're right. It was Baz Luhrman's "Elvis":

I would have enjoyed this so much more on my TV. In fact, I would have enjoyed it much more if it had been made as a TV mini-series with 5 or 6 hour-long episodes. Because this movie was too long and too short. There were so many ideas that could have been worked through. There were 2 big themes: Elvis's relationship to black people and their music and Elvis's bondage to Colonel Tom Parker. That had to be compressed in the movie, and the movie was still 2 hours and 39 minutes. 

"Gatsby feels like a well-rehearsed classic in which the actors say their lines ably..."

"... but with no discernible feeling behind them."

ADDED: Rotten Tomatoes shows 38% good reviews.

New "Gatsby" trailer.

Now, with even more anachronistic pop music, including Beyonce singing Amy Winehouse.

Baz Luhrmann's "Gatsby."

If you loved "Moulin Rouge," as I did, you may find the new trailer thrilling:



I was literally thrilled. And I'm very skeptical of all movies. I resist going to the movies. I see one comment over at YouTube whining about this not being in 3D. 3D is a curse. I've vowed never again to see a movie shot in 3D unless it's in a 3D theater. I saw that most recent "Planet of the Apes" movie, which was shot as a 3D movie, in a non-3D theater, and it was full of dumb shots — objects placed in the extreme foreground, actors framed in a way that you could tell was for an effect that you weren't able to see. I'd love to see "Life of Pi," but I put off going, because it's such an ordeal to engage with a 3D experience, and now it's only around here in non-3D, and I can't go, because of my vow. I'm delighted that Luhrmann didn't mess up the visuals to pander to the 3D dweebs.

Here, you can read "The Great Gatsby" on line, in a nice format. This is one of my favorite books. What I like is that each sentence is good, on its own. Seriously. Test it out. "As my train emerged from the tunnel into sunlight, only the hot whistles of the National Biscuit Company broke the simmering hush at noon." Every sentence is a writer's inspiration. I'll vouch for that.

ADDED: A trailer was put out last summer using many of the same visuals and a very different audio track, and I blogged at the time: "It looks awful, with horrible acting." I'd forgotten that! Here's the old trailer:



But I did say: "But then I think it's like 'Moulin Rouge,' which can seem bad if you look at it the wrong way, and this new 'Gatsby; is in fact directed by the same person, Baz Luhrmann." There's a fine line — in some quarters — between garbage and greatness.