Boobolotry

Elegy

Crit

Based on Philip Roth's The Dying Animal, and though I've never read the novel, the Rothian themes are familiar: lust, age, irrational jealousy, fear of inadequacy, and the terrifying thrill of the young, beautiful, easily objectifiable woman. Look, unlike a (heterosexual male) friend of mine who once famously referred to her as "that little troll," I really enjoy looking at Penélope Cruz, and yes, at her naked breasts. But even with a woman director (Isabel Coixet, who has the rare double of also serving as the music supervisor), I can't help but see the final excuse for dwelling lovingly on Cruz's chest as characteristic more of Portnoy-era Rothian puerility than of the guy who has written American Pastoral and The Human Stain, among other grown-up novels, in the past decade. I invite correction, but it seems to me that the only way a woman would make the request that leads to the shirt shedding is if she is so accustomed to being objectified that she has internalized objectification.

Random, mostly cranky, notes:

• What the hell is My Future Wife Patricia Clarkson doing naked in bed with Ben Kingsley?
• Vancouver???!!! Jesus, Toronto's bad enough, but now cinematic Manhattan has moved to Canada's West Coast!
• Are we really to believe that someone as cosmopolitan as Kingsley's David Kepesh doesn't know how to pronounce Castillo?
• Didn't recognize her in her first, daylight, scene, but then with night lighting (her second and, sadly, final scene, though her agent got her major billing in the end titles), it hit me: Debbie Harry!
• What does it tell us when the voice of reason in a film comes from Dennis Hopper?

Trailers

• The Women--Trailer answers the biggest question I had: yes, apparently it does maintain the no-men approach of the 1939 original; still, without George Cukor, looks iffy: 3.
• What Just Happened?--Barry Levinson directs a great De Niro-led cast in one of my favorite subgenres: the ain't-Hollywood-fucked-up? flick.
• Just for fun, and to gauge how desperately Disney is marketing the flick, I'm going to try to keep track of the number of times I have to sit through the Morning Light trailer: that's 2.