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Supermensch: The Legend of Shep Gordon – Various definitions would define this Yiddish word as meaning an honest, upstanding person having admirable characteristics of integrity and responsibility (and probably much more especially if you add the “super” to the word). Mike Myers, the director and producer of this film, obviously feels that way about Shep Gordon as do a great deal of other celebrities who have crossed paths with him. Early in the film we meet him as a 22 year old kid who chooses to stay in the Hollywood Motel where he has a chance encounter with Alice Cooper, Janis Joplin and Jimmy Hendrix. He begins to manage Cooper and is shown to skillfully manipulate his career to gigantic proportions. They ultimately become lifelong friends. The movie unfolds with narration by a very long list of famous people such as Michael Douglas, Sylvester Stallone, Tom Arnold, Anne Murray and many, many more, all who speak about him with great affection. There are numerous film clips of Gordon interacting with this endless A list even including Groucho Marx. His early years of sex, drugs and rock and roll was documented as well as his moving relationship with Teddy Pendergrass after he became paraplegic in a car wreck and yet was brought back to sing in a full stadium by Gordon. He was also depicted as the man who established the concept of celebrity chefs and brought these culinary experts such as Emeril Lagasse and many others to have the opportunity to reap the fame and fortune that they deserved. The supermensch was shown to be just that because he apparently had a philosophy of being loyal to his friends and sharing his great success with others. The film touched upon his upbringing and gave a hint that Gordon was developing a warm caring extended family with so many of the well known entertainers that he met perhaps because he didn’t have a very supportive family especially not his mother and his older brother. Meyers, who is well known for his comedic expertise tried to bring out the emotional underpinnings of his subject in his directorial debut. He skillfully blended in some very realistic enactments, which gave a visual flow to some of the narration. The film was fast moving and the 84 minutes did fly by as a great deal of inside show business was revealed to the viewer. The latter part of the film focused on the price that the Supermensch paid from his doing so much for others. We get the sense that despite an endless group of caring appreciative friends, he was holding in a sadness over the fact that he never had his own family. (2014)

HOW MANY MOVIE THEATERS ARE WITHIN 30 MINUTES OF YOUR HOME??

We just read an article in the New York Times which noted that in the Bronx (which is a section of New York City), there are 1.4 million inhabitants but only two movie theaters We were quite surprised. We live in Los Angeles and there is a much larger concentration of movie theaters which would be expected since there are many film production companies in this area. However, we wondered how many movie theaters are within ½ hour drive of the readers of this blog. We would like to try a survey, which we hope the readers of this blog will consider answering.

Please answer the following questions

1-   What city and country do you live?

2-   How many movie theaters do you know that are within ½ drive hour from where you live?

3-   What % of movies that you watch do you see in movie theaters?

4-   What % of movies that you watch do you see on Netflix, other services or DVDs on your television or computer?

5-   If you put any comments below, can we reprint them in our blog ? We will not print email addresses which will be confidential and will only use any name that is put in the comment)

Put any comments below:

Please copy and paste this page and send it in an email or as an attachment  to Mblumenfield@gmail.com

There will be a random drawing from among the people who reply and  a free  great movie DVD will be sent to  2 winners (we will ask winners for their mailing address)

Thank you

M&S

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Chef-rm This is an extremely well done movie about food and much more. Chef Carl Casper is played by Jon Favreau who write the screenplay, directed and coproduced the movie) is the famous chef of a well know restaurant in Los Angeles. He finds himself at odds with owner of the restaurant (Dustin Hoffman) who wants him to prepare and serve his standards rather then be newly creative on the day that famous food reviewer Ramsey Michel (Oliver Platt) will be visiting the restaurant. The critic pans the Chef for being unimaginative and at an expected repeat visit, Casper quits rather be then be forced to stifle his creativity once again. This ultimately leads to foodie road trip in a food truck with Casper, Percy (Emjay Anthony) his 10-year-old son and Martin, a staff cook who formerly worked for him(John Leguizamo). We see the great passion that the deposed chef has for food and it’s preparation but also see the tender father son relationship which is played out by the son wanting to learn about food and the father who really puts him to work but teaches him his love and skill of this genre. Sofia Vergara has never looked better as the beautiful but very caring ex-wife. Scarlett Johansson likewise is very appealing as the empathic hostess at his previous restaurant. The road trip starts off in Miami where the food truck is put together and we can almost taste the Cuban food, which becomes an important part of the menu of the truck. The Cuban music beat becomes the pulse of this film and the face of it is Cuban musician Jose C. Hernandez who plays the father of Casper’s ex-wife and the grandfather of the boy. His playing is a recurrent strong part of the wonderful musical background of this story. We also experience the great music and atmosphere of New Orleans which is the next stop on this trip. The food truck becomes very popular here and we are shown the familiar views of this great city while the musical beat goes on. Perhaps characterizing the chef’s relationship with his son, as he buys him the famous product from the Café Du Mundo, he says to him, “ Eat it slowly, you are never going to taste your first beignet again.” Next stop was Austin, Texas where the food truck also achieved great popularity while the music of Gary Clark Jr. played on. Final stop was back home in Los Angeles where this food truck and it’s great crew held their own against other food trucks in downtown LA. Aside from the great screenplay and very fine acting by an outstanding cast, especially Mr. Fareau who is on screen most of the time, there are three non-human stars of this movie. We have already highlighted the music. Of course there is the food and Los Angeles chef Roy Choi should be included in the kudos since he was the food consultant and there were many mouthwatering scenes of very appealing food. The third star was modern technology, particularly social media and the cell phone with constant tweeting. It was tweets that spread the word about the food critic’s views, the counter arguments of the chef and the popularity of the gallivanting food truck. Also the movie was topped off with a few weeks of one second per day video clips posted on the Internet, put all together by Percy the Chef’s young son which summed up his affection for his dad and the journey on which this movie had taken us all. (2014)

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Emoticon ;)- sp – It is very exciting to see a small, low budget film successfully get it’s point across in an excellent movie. In this case Livia DePaolis a young actress, co-wrote the screenplay with then film student Sarah Nerbose. Ms. Depaolis also produced and directed as well as star in it. She was able to get veteran actor Michael Cristofer to co-star with her as well as bring in Carol Kane, Sonia Braga and excellent teenage actors, Miles Chandler, Allie Gallerani, Charlie Solis, Sydney Morton and Alesandra Socah. The film examines various aspects of family relationships in a contemporary upper class New York City. It also uses the prism of modern day social media to help the viewer see everyday happenings as the characters might very well been doing. Elena is a single 33 year old graduate student who has a relationship with Walter who is a 64 year old divorced man with two adopted teenage children to whom she becomes connected. The kid’s struggle with their own identity both sexual and racial, as well as Elena relationship with them and her own examination of her feelings about having her own children are all opened up for viewing. The filmmaker appeared to be using Elena’s graduate school thesis as metaphor for this movie. It is that the wide spread use of social media is so much a part of human relationships it actually changes them. From our point of view the movie didn’t need this approach. The characters all had depth and showed complexity, growth and change. The story stood on it’s own and we felt the use of social media was almost incidental. The characters could have just as well been talking on the telephone instead of on Facebook but it was a clever and original perspective none-the-less. We look towards a very bright career for the talented Ms. DePaolis. (2014)

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Promised Land-nf This was a Matt Damon film that was not a blockbuster movie but it certainly makes an important statement about a controversial socio-economic issue of our time and that is fracking. We suspect that is why Damon chose to produce and star in this film. It is directed by Gus Van Sant (Good Will Hunting , Milk). Two sales pros Steve Butler (Matt Damon) and Sue Thompson (Frances McDormand) from a gigantic corporation named Global come to a small farming town to buy the drilling rights from the residents who have been hard hit by bad economic times. Can you imagine such a farming family turning down what seems like a lot of money which might go a long way to helping their kids get a good education or for some other very desired endeavor? Everyone knows that home grown natural gas is cleaner and less expensive than imported oil so wouldn’t this be a good thing all around? But is the process that is necessary to bring it out of the ground 100% safe? Could this process, fracking, be an ultimate horror? Might it harm or even destroy their livestock and be dangerous to people’s health? Would a billion dollar corporation manipulate the facts and convince the local folks to buy into their plan ? Is the risk really infinitesimal? To what extent would big business go to in order to buy these rights? Can a local science teacher (Hal Holbrook) who happens to know a little more than he was expected to know, make a difference in this debate? It is clear that Damon and company were out to raise serious questions about fracking. After you see this film, what will you think? (2012)