'Dirty Girls'
A place to talk about movies--old and new, good and bad, high art and high cheese. It's the place to place your kittens on the award winners, gossip about upcoming fims and discuss DVD releases and extras. Spoiler policy: White font all plot-related discussion until a movie's been in wide release two weeks, and keep the major HSQ in white font until two weeks after the video/DVD release.
I can think of one actor who does this (Clooney); I doubt there are more than half a dozen who could.
Really? I can think of an awful lot of actors who made their directoral debut at the helm of a multi-million dollar movies. Often, though not always, starring themselves. I'm not a conspiracy nut, but that seems like a remarkable coincidence.
It is a good point, that you can't not-see the bad performance as easily as you can avoid a vanity project.
From way back:
It's frustrating, because I feel like he could be the next Kubrick, and instead he's gonna wind up as the next Spielberg
Really? When I think of Kubrick, I think of sophisticated intellectualism (and other less flattering things); when I think of Shyamalan, I think of empty-headedness.
Colin Farrell is overacting in a bad way
Does he still look perpetually constipated? I'd assumed it was an acting choice in The New World before I saw him as himself, face clouded with the pain of the backed-up, in the dvd extras.
I remember a review of LotR:FotR that mentioned in a tangent that the reviewer thought that Viggo would have made an incredible Lt. John Dunbar in Dances with Wolves (apparently, Viggo's good friends with Michael Blake, the screenwriter), but Costner wouldn't have gotten the green light for the movie without agreeing to star in it as well as direct.
Really? I can think of an awful lot of actors who made their directoral debut at the helm of a multi-million dollar movies. Often, though not always, starring themselves. I'm not a conspiracy nut, but that seems like a remarkable coincidence.
Undoubtedly there are a lot of actor-directors, but I still only can think of one where it seems a clear case of the studio backing a vanity project to get him to act in their movies. (ETA: currently; I think Kevin Costner may be in that category in the past) It seems to me that there would be very few because there are very few actors where the studio can toss them a couple dozen millions in order to make a guaranteed blockbuster with them later. I don't think Clint Eastwood is being given vanity projects because he's a big box office draw, I know Mel Gibson wasn't, nor is Favreau or Tucci or Braff or whoever.
Which is not to say that those people can't get small investors, just that they're not pressuring a studio to back a project with the promise of another blockbuster later.
ETA2: Maybe Tom Hanks with That Thing You Do!
When I think of Kubrick, I think of sophisticated intellectualism (and other less flattering things); when I think of Shyamalan, I think of empty-headedness.
Well, that's the "turning out to be Spielberg" part... I associate the three because of their visual precision and control. Just on a technical level. It's not about their intelligence or depth or anything else.
they're not pressuring a studio to back a project with the promise of another blockbuster later.
Oh, wait, maybe I misunderstood what you were objecting to? Or maybe I'm just confused generally. I do remember that in exchange for doing Ghostbusters, Bill Murray got to make Razor's Edge (which he didn't direct, but he did star & co-write). Those kinds of deals don't require that someone be such a huge star that their name alone can guarantee a blockbuster. It's when X star in Y project is a potential blockbuster that you get tit-for-tat deals; in general I think that kind of arrangement is less common. So if that specific idea is what you were objecting to, sorry if I confused the issue.
I think it's much more common that the actor directs and also stars. And because they star, the movie pays for itself. Or so they hope. I could swear that much is still true for Eastwood, at least sometimes. Didn't he have to be in Million Dollar Baby to get it made? I could swear I've seen something like about one of his recent-ish movies. Anyway, I think all I'm saying is, whichever variation, it's still using your star power to get a directing job.
Movie image quiz. God, I suck. 8, but I feel so close on at least four more.
I've got 10 so far.
Hm, I got 18, but there's definitely a few I know I know. Y'know?