My Best Friend Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Writer-director Wes Anderson is probably most famous for his quirky character studies, but lately you can't help but notice the guy has been branching out. First up was an animated film, and now it's on to any studio's most prized posession: the remake. Variety reports that Anderson has signed with Universal and Imagine Entertainment to write a remake of the 2006 French comedy, Mon meilleur ami (My Best Friend). So far, Anderson is just in charge of the script, but there's already talk he might be eying the project as his next directorial gig.

Patrice Leconte's original film starred Daniel Auteuil as a cantankerous antiques dealer who has the misfortune of overhearing his friends at a dinner party. When he learns the unfortunate truth about what they really think of him, he's forced to acknowledge his unappealing traits. But the humiliation doesn't stop there; our unloved antiquarian then makes a bet with a business partner to produce at least one friend, and of course, he doesn't have any. So instead, he hires an amiable cab driver to pose as his life-long pal.

There has always been a touch of the misanthropic in Anderson's work, so it seems like My Best Friend would be a natural fit. Besides, now that Anderson has finished working on the adaptation of Roald Dahl's The Fantastic Mr. Fox, it's the perfect time to lock him into his next job. So even if the guy doesn't decide to direct, at least we are getting a Wes Anderson script ... and that should count for something, right?

Would you want to see a Wes Anderson-penned film that wasn't also directed by the man himself?

My latest starting point is DVD Talk; their list is not comprehensive, but I appreciate the simplicity. Looking over what's out this week, I realized I need to watch more movies in theaters! I haven't seen any of these releases yet, but I plan to do some catching up. My rental picks begin with Patrice Leconte's My Best Friend. Monika Bartyzel called it "an entertaining, solid comedy." Daniel Auteuil plays "a completely conceited art dealer who is stunned to learn that none of his so-called friends like him" and is inspired to gamble on himself. The DVD from IFC includes a "making of" feature and the trailer.

The Trials of Darryl Hunt "tells the story of ... a black man who was tried and convicted for the rape and murder of [a] white newspaper reporter," according to Christopher Campbell. "Hunt was sentenced despite there being no physical evidence, simply off a testimonial given by a former Ku Klux Klan member." ThinkFilm's DVD includes bonus interviews and an "exclusive HBO featurette."

Another doc, Crazy Love, about a long-term relationship with, shall we say, questionable elements, made James Rocchi wonder: "What movie didn't get in to Sundance because this horrible, clammy, grim and pathetic tale of co-dependent madness did?" But Kim Voynar had a very different view, describing it as "an engaging, intelligent" film. Magnolia's DVD features an audio commentary by co-director Dan Klores and the couple, deleted scenes and other extras.

Other titles that sound intriguing include documentary Girl 27 (a woman hired as a movie extra in the 1930s is instead raped at an MGM party) and the box set Carlos Saura's Flamenco Trilogy (including Blood Wedding, Carmen and El Amor Brujo) from Criterion.

Lately, there have been three kinds of comedies, the stupid comedy is the most common, and the very occasional smart comedy pops up every so often, but the most intriguing kind is the smart-stupid comedy. The smart-stupid comedy is a movie that looks stupid and pretends to be stupid, but is actually very smart. Critics and audiences can very easily detect which of these movies is which, and everyone seems to prefer the smart-stupid brand. Examples from recent years include Office Space, Napoleon Dynamite, Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, Wedding Crashers, The 40 Year-Old Virgin, Clerks II, Borat, Talladega Nights, Blades of Glory, The Simpsons Movie and the new Superbad. Even the Jackass movies -- which I haven't seen -- have their defenders among the intellectual elite.

If you can strike this formula, you're in for box office and critical gold -- and perhaps even an Oscar nomination. Knocked Up (297 screens) has been one of the summer's most enjoyable movies and one its biggest surprises. I almost didn't attend a press screening because it looked like a variation on the dreadful American Pie movies, but the buzz got to me and I went, and I'm glad I did. Judd Apatow's movie isn't much different from the formula of a beautiful girl redeeming a pathetic schlub, but this time it feels as if it came from a genuine place, as if the schlub really felt these things and was expressing his gratitude. For the lowbrows in the audience, Apatow gives his hero a selection of even dorkier roommates with lots of hilarious, shocking things to say and do, but the movie's main drive is pure.

One of my favorite films from TIFF last year -- Patrice Leconte's Mon Meilleur Ami -- just hit theaters a few days ago, and somehow I missed it. Luckily, it's not too late to go on about why you should see this movie. Why do I care? Beyond the fact that it is an entertaining, solid comedy, we've got a chance here to patronize a great foreign language film and show that North America can handle a non-English film that isn't directed by Mel Gibson or Clint Eastwood. In February, I posted about how Brian Grazer and Universal were already gearing up for an English-language remake. But why bother when the film is now on the big screen?

Mon Meilluer Ami, which is titled My Best Friend for North American audiences, is about François Coste (Daniel Auteuil), a completely conceited art dealer who is stunned to learn that none of his so-called friends like him. Of course, he denies the accusation, and his business partner makes a bet with him -- he can keep an expensive Greek vase he picked up with their business' money if he can produce a genuine best friend. If he can't, the vase is hers. After stumbling upon an eternally-jovial cabbie a few times, he hires the man to teach him how to find a friend.

You can check out the trailer over at the film's website. The film is only in limited release now, but hopefully all of you lovely cinemagoers will patronize the available screenings like mad and inspire IFC to send the film to more theaters.

Michael Moore is not as popular a magician as Harry Potter, but he can still draw a crowd. Sicko made an estimated $2.6 million over the weekend, according to Variety, reflecting a downturn of just 26% from the previous weekend. In view of the expansion by distributor The Weinstein Co. to 756 screens, the relatively small percentage drop-off in box office indicates that word of mouth is good. So far, Sicko has earned $15.8 million, which puts it on pace to overtake Moore's earlier Bowling for Columbine and last year's Oscar-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth.

My Best Friend, the latest from French director Patrice Leconte, had the highest per-screen average among indie releases, chalking up $15,508 each at three screens. Not far behind was Talk to Me, which had an average take of $11,841 from 33 screens in its opening weekend. Also in its first weekend of release on six screens, Interview made an estimated $41,620, while Rescue Dawn averaged more than $9,000 on 38 screens. Introducing the Dwights sank to $2,600 per screen. The weekend's financial stars include You Kill Me ($620,288; cumulative total $1.5 million), La Vie en Rose ($545,693; $6.9 million) and Once ($325,000; $5.0 million). All of these films -- except one -- have been covered at Cinematical, either with reviews or an interview, and I've linked to our coverage so you can have a look at what our critics had to say.

More on Sicko: Kim Voynar just posted her Film Clips column this morning, in which she puts the earnings of Sicko in broader perspective, among other things. As a further point for discussion, Variety notes that The Weinstein Co. avoids box office comparisons to Fahrenheit 9/11 -- and rightly so, as that film was a phenomenon not likely to be repeated -- but then adds its own opinion that Fahrenheit had a topic "much broader in appeal." Is that true for you? Did you see Fahrenheit 9/11 but decide to skip Sicko because its topic isn't as appealing?