Welcome to the Matt Damon Column,
a forum for sharing news among Matt fans.

• A big thanks to the reader who wrote to let us in on this big news:
  Matt and Billy Bob Thornton will be on Oprah this Wednesday.
  11/22/00 — Matt Damon & Billy Bob Thornton (PG)
  Ladies and gentlemen…
  Today, Academy Award (R) winners, Matt Damon and Billy Bob Thorton!
  You’ll hear about everything from their new movie, All The Pretty Horses, to phobias, the fleeting nature of success and on-set practical jokes.
  … plus, a mystery caller!
  (Footnote: Last year Matt also appeared on Oprah just before Thanksgiving, to promot "The Talented Mr. Ripley". Oprah has always been very kind to Matt; and her endorsement of the movie is a very big deal.)

• Got a response from Erin (thanks) to the query posted yesterday:
  There were a few songs in the trailer, the U2 one I just thought of ("All I Want Is You", correct?)...but there's a Mazzy Star song called "Fade Into You" that I believe was on there too. I FINALLY saw the trailer today before I watched Bounce (which, by the way, was kind of a disappointment...I wish Ben would play something more than the superficial roles he's been picking...I've read that Gwyneth told him he should play this role but I'm left wondering WHY??) Anyway, back to the trailer...I saw a couple other good trailers too but I'm pretty sure that Mazzy Star song was in there. I cannot believe how beautiful that trailer was and how much the scenes they showed hit me as extremely close to how I pictured them as I was reading the novel. I think it's the kind of book that's going to come across very well translated into a film. I'm unbelieveably excited!
• Shelley (thanks!) also wrote:
  the U2 song is "all i want is you". which, by the way is one of my absolute favorite u2 songs :) i LOVED the preview...saw it for the first time last night before "bounce"
• Great finds from Felicity:
  • There's another Pretty Horses review at AICN - itäs described as being too short at 1 hour 45 mins. How short is this thing going to go?
    Here'the text:
    A look at ALL THE PRETTY HORSES
    Hey folks, Harry here with a report from Nanki-Poo on ALL THE PRETTY HORSES. Man, it feels as though this has been forever in coming to a theater near you and I... but it had trouble when it was at Sony, but now at Miramax... everything seems to be rather smooth for the production and the resulting film. This should be a rather good sweeping epic, a new genre for us to see coming from Billy Bob Thornton... But dagnamit, I'm ready to see this sucker... Only about a month to wait.... Here ya go...
    Hey there Harry, Nanki-Poo here,
    I recently attended a screening of the film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's widely acclaimed first novel ALL THE PRETTY HORSES. Now Miramax is obviously gearing this oft-delayed film as their "for your consideration" offering of 2000--with a scheduled Christmas release. Indeed this film wears its Oscar credentials on its sleeve: Oscar winner Billy "Bob" Thronton directs Oscar winner/nominee Matt Damon in a film written by Oscar winner Ted Tally, produced by Oscar winner Mike Nichols.
    The story takes place in the late 1940s and involves Matt Damon, as John Grady Cole, a young rancher who travels to Mexico with his friend Lacey Rawlings (played by Henry Thomas) after his Texas ranch is sold off. John's passion in life is horses: training and breeding them. Once he finds himself on a large Mexican ranch (really his personal El Dorado) owned by "Rocha" played by Ruben Blades, he finds the 2nd passion of his life--Alejandra, Rocha's raven haired beauty of a daughter. It doesn't take x-ray vision to see that a hired hand from America courting the owner's daughter is a recipe for trouble, and the Mexican legal system is played up for all the ugliness it is so well-known for
    First of all, the film is beautifully shot, and I can only assume the final print will be even better when finalized. The performances and script are uniformly strong, though the standouts are often the supporting character parts--which often resonant with more interest and originality. Lucas Black as the gangly but strong-willed Blevins--who John and Lacey happen upon on their trip through Mexico is quirky, funny and very well protrayed--we're talking Best Supporting nod here (and he actually looks 16)! Another character that caught my eye was Alejandra's aunt--in a few nicely written and acted scenes this actor--I forget her name creates a strong, mature Hispanic female.
    Henry Thomas and Matt Damon share a good synergy as cowboy buddies (with believable Texas accents, too) and cameos provided by Sam Shepard, Robert Patrick and Bruce Dern are nicely played though fleeting.
    The problem with the film is that, like the novel, the narrative is episodic and picaresque, and John Cole's arc -- his joys and sorrows really hinge on his love for Alejandra and the horses. Unfortunately this cut of the film short-shrifts us on the romance and the horse "whispering"--the emotional threads that tie the film together. The result is a film that is marred by a narrative jumpiness. I had heard of earlier, longer screenings of over two hours. The version we saw was a multiplex friendly 1 hour and 45 minutes. Not to put too fine a point on it, but if Thornton and Miramax can find a good 10 to 15 minutes to place back in, it could have a film that successfully marries all its good elements into a whole that could very well be the "for your consideration" film they are looking for.
  • In a story about how popular the "new" golf hole at Kiawah Island has become, the course spokesman says:
    Smith, according to Vegis, is all but addicted to golf. ``Between takes, if he had an hour, he'd go out and play three or four holes. Matt Damon (a novice at the outset) was learning. He played a lot while he was here, and our director of golf instruction said he was developing an incredibly good swing.''
  • The Friday movie column at the Wall Street Journal has joined the crowds by stating that Colin Farrell is the next Matt (not sure if they mean just for the Minority Report or on a larger scale).
  • This could be interesting, from IMDB:
    Cruise Sets Movie Sights On Best-Seller
    Tom Cruise (photos) is understood to be among Hollywood stars showing an interest in a movie of Dave Eggers' best-selling memoir A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. New Line Cinema has paid $1.8 million for rights to the book, which details the author's life after both his parents died of cancer. Eggers, according to associates, will donate much of his fees to various cancer charities and will have the right to co-write a film treatment. The story, says sources, has fascinated Cruise and a string of other star names including Matt Damon (photos) and Ben Affleck (photos). One source says, "It's very hard, nitty gritty stuff of which dreams are made for any actor. But it's also tough, about loss, about a guy raising his younger brother. You could fall right on your face. There is a lot of interest tainted by caution."
    The book is highly recommended, especially for about the first 150 pages (loses most of its way after that). It is told in a remarkable, personable, self-aware style, and has similarities to language in GWH, as Eggers is from Boston. One to watch.

• A reader wrote:
  THIS IS DRIVING ME NUTS. What is the name of the song in the All The Pretty Horses trailer? Not the U2 one, the other one. I've heard it before, and I just love it and can't find it and I want to knoooow
  If you have an answer to this note, please write me.
• From USA Today:
  For 'Horses,' Stuart settles the score
  "I see it as John Ford with mushrooms in his pockets," Marty Stuart says of his vivid score for All the Pretty Horses, Billy Bob Thornton's screen version of the Cormac McCarthy best seller. The country singer's task was daunting. Thornton originally hired musician/producer Daniel Lanois, but Miramax balked at the result. Enter other composers, whose fine-tuning also failed to satisfy. A studio-director squabble ensued until Thornton enlisted longtime buddy Stuart, who first tweaked Lanois' music but ultimately wrote a fresh score. The film, due Dec. 25, stars Matt Damon and Penelope Cruz in a "danged ol' cowboy movie that called for classic American sounds and, when it moves into Mexico, classic Spanish sounds," Stuart says. Inspired by Bernard Hermann's scores for Alfred Hitchcock thrillers, Stuart says film music "should be a pond that simply reflects what's on top. (Horses) needed a score that's undeniably elegant, but the guy in the pickup truck in Iowa should be able to whistle the melody the day after seeing the movie."
• Steph sent in a couple of funny items:
  • When someone mentioned that Rodney Dangerfield mentioned Matt I believe what he said was that if he were gay, he would go for Matt. Ben just laughed and said he knew how Rodney felt and he could put in a phone call for him if he wanted him to. It was pretty funny if you saw it.
  • And last night, Ben Affleck was on Craig Kilborn. It was a really funny interview. He mentioned the story about the PlayStations. He said he needs another one because Matt called him up and said that when he plugged it in, It just burnt up and broke. Ben laughed because it was an error on Matt's fault. The voltage in Europe is different and he didn't even take that into consideration.
    (Sigh. As we all know, Matt was an English major at Harvard. My apologies to other English majors who are more practically inclined. :-)
• In an article on handicapping this year's Oscars nods in today's Los Angeles Times:
  And what of the movies that didn't do well? Most insiders agree that "Pay It Forward" looked promising at the outset because it starred two Oscar winners ... But the film was seriously damaged by critics and has done only moderate business ..., and insiders say it has completely lost momentum. "The Legend of Bagger Vance," directed by Oscar winner Robert Redford and starring another Oscar winner, Matt Damon, also had some buzz going into its theatrical release. Revies were mixed and ticket sales so-so. That was enough was most handicappers to strike it from their list of potential nominees, they say.
• The ever-reliable Felicity (our eternal gratitude to her, needless to say), from a very far-flung corner in the world:
  • Found an article with Robert Patrick (new of X-files and also in ATPH). In it he says that he "loved his role in Pretty Horses, Matt was teriffic (sorry, forgotten how to spell in this cold climate) and Billy Bob Thornton was a great director" or words very similar.
  • I've found a previews magazine available at cinemas here which has a page or so on all films coming out over the next couple of months. There's a page on Pretty Horses, with a date of winter given only. But there's actually two new photos with the story: one's of a flock of white horses (about ten or so) on the run in the wild, and the other's a shot of Matt and Henry Thomas with ropes at the corral. Rather cool pics.
  • From Variety, details of the "Oceans Eleven" filming¨ :
    Brad Pitt will complete "Spy Game" in time for his February start in "Ocean's 11," Jerry Weintraub, producer of the latter, tells me.
    His troupe includes George Clooney, Matt Damon and Julia Roberts. They'll film at the MGM Grand, Mirage, Bellagio and Caesars Palace, where all the heists occur the night of a big championship fight. Steven Soderbergh directs and Weintraub says, "If it weren't for him (Soderbergh) -- and George (Clooney) we wouldn't have been able to get this cast together."
  • From the Daily Mail London on Friday - the actor in "Bourne Identity" with the African sounding name (can't remember) will be playing the African president. How many people can be offended there...

• This from Val:
  The long version of Ben's interview w/ Diane Sawyer aired last night. Ben took Diane on a guided tour of his neighborhood in Boston. He pointed out Matt's childhood home as well. I believe the one shown is the communal home Matt and his Mother lived in. Diane pretty much nailed him on his current feelings for Gwyneth. She pointed out that his entire face and demeanor changes when he thinks/speaks of her: ... "women across are America are analyzing this and many would think he still so in love with her." He was quiet and contemplative for a bit and then saved himself with wit by saying something like, "Women sitting at home also do a lot of shopping at the Joan Rivers jewelry collection, so women sitting at home can’t always be trusted."
  He also made reference to his "shoot the moon" personality versus being conservative. {He also discusses this in TALK comparing his 'go for it' attitude versus Matt's "I won't do this or that and I won't be hurt."}
  You can read the transcipt of Ben's interview at this link.
  Later on Leno, Ben did impersonations of Al Gore, George W. and President Clinton. He also told the story of how he and Matt mistakingly auditioned for parts on the Mickey Mouse Club when they were 15/17 years old. They thought they were up for movie parts and were quite embarassed when they found out. The train ride back to Boston was quiet and they never spoke of that trip to NY again.
• From Felicity:
  • From USA Today, confirmation of the change of composer for Horses:
    For 'Horses,' Stuart settles the score
    ''I see it as John Ford with mushrooms in his pockets,'' Marty Stuart says of his vivid score for All the Pretty Horses, Billy Bob Thornton's screen version of the Cormac McCarthy best seller. The country singer's task was daunting.
    Thornton originally hired musician/producer Daniel Lanois, but Miramax balked at the result. Enter other composers, whose fine-tuning also failed to satisfy. A studio-director squabble ensued until Thornton enlisted longtime buddy Stuart, who first tweaked Lanois' music but ultimately wrote a fresh score. The film, due Dec. 25, stars Matt Damon and Penelope Cruz in a ''danged ol' cowboy movie that called for classic American sounds and, when it moves into Mexico, classic Spanish sounds,'' Stuart says. ''The obvious thing would have been lots of Sergio Leone twangy guitars. I wanted to steer clear of that and any heavy country inflections.''
    Inspired by Bernard Hermann's scores for Alfred Hitchcock thrillers, Stuart says film music ''should be a pond that simply reflects what's on top. (Horses) needed a score that's undeniably elegant, but the guy in the pickup truck in Iowa should be able to whistle the melody the day after seeing the movie.''
    -- Edna Gundersen
  • A Penelope gossip story from the Ny post:
    Ralph gets handbagged
    SAYING Ralph Lauren and Calvin Klein are rivals is as obvious as noting that Al Gore and George W. Bush aren't on the same political page. So one of my society spies was most amused to see Penelope Cruz (on a break from shooting "Vanilla Sky" here with Tom Cruise) shopping for pocketbooks in Calvin's Madison Avenue boutique. Penelope is the new face of Ralph's perfume ads, and I don't think he'll appreciate the idea of her patronizing Klein.
  • From an Associated Press story with Ben:
    Without going into specifics, Affleck says he and Damon, his childhood friend from Cambridge, Mass., are writing a script they hope to co-direct.
  • Did anyone see Leno last night? Apparently Ben Affleck was on with Rodney Dangerfield (comic) who made some positive comments about Matt??
  • From a postive summary on the National Review website: Matt Damon delivers yet another star turn as the haunted golfer, showing considerable range as he grows from a battle-scarred veteran to a man on the mend. In a small, intriguing touch, we see Private Ryan back in France, only this time in a World War I uniform.
  • From another Ben interview:
    Bounce isn't the first time Miramax has borrowed some of Affleck's reality to help at the box-office.
    "Good Will Hunting was the first time I think that people started to really know who [Matt Damon and I] were," said Affleck. "Miramax certainly -- and Matt and I weren't complicit in it, we weren't aware of it, we were naive in a lot of ways, but -- they used the hook of our friendship as a marketing tool, to push the movie. . . .
    "We just sort of thought, Well, it's true, you know? Yeah, we're friends. And we didn't think it would be a) so novel and b) so material to the story. But being the savvy marketers [Miramax] are, they exploited that rather deftly."
  • On the Pretty Horses press, I believe it will gear up. Other movies coming out around Christmas are only now just releasing their posters and trailers, and Miramax will go all out to push the movie. In the latest Entertainment Weekly, an article specifies who each studio will be pushing for Oscars: for Miramax it's Matt and Gwyneth to make up for last year when both missed nominations for Ripley.

• Felicity finally got hold of a copy of "Talk", and expressed her reactions elegantly:
  A few notes on the Talk issue:
  • The interviewer, Chris Connelly, is the same guy who interviewed Ben two months ago, but I think only one question was exactly the same (Mickey Mouse Club)
  • I especially loved the photo taken of Matt looking back onto Los Angeles - damn attractive shot!
  • I liked the baseball story at the start - both that Pedro likes him and that his friends are so impressed by that incident (you can tell Matt is still completely on the level with his friends/homies!)
  • All of the usual anecdotes were repeated, but most with a small bit of extra information (the Ed Norton meeting, the Leo meeting). Interesting that he clicked with Ed immediately.
  • It was a remarkably "macho" article, if you understand my meaning. There were no females mentioned in speech (except for the radio announcer's wife and brief mentions of mother or girlfriends). All the activities were male-oriented (baseball, ranching, golf championships, male directors, male actors), and there's no female presence.
  • All articles from the BV release are remarkably non-personal. Virtually none mention any real personal life: one says he is rumoured to have a girlfriend, two say he is rumoured not to have a girlfriend. They are incredibly non-intimate (yes, controlled by PR and by the normal reticence not to speak on anything of 'tabloid' human interest). Ben's Talk interview in comparison is very emotive and personal, talking about rifts in relationships and current/past girlfriends and emotional states. If we want another link, his latest movie (Bounce) is all about breaking and repairing of relationships (much emoting), while Matt's (ATPH) is all about a repressed young man who is unable to share any feelings, and barely able to cope with the changes around him (book summary badly condensed).
  • The only thing of 'personal' interest in the Talk story is really the note that he now has two nephews (another son to Kyle), and in the earthquake story Ben thought firstly of Matt (screaming for him) rather than his brother Casey. And that Matt remains close to Casey (staying with him in NY).
  • To put the major interviews in chronological order, the Talk intv occurred two days before the USA Weekend one.
  • And to clarify, Matt says in the article that the four hour version of ATPH is the best movie that he has been in, not the best that he's seen.
  • Funny that the issue had posters for other Miramax movies (Chocolat), but not one for ATPH. Apart from that, the Talk magazine is actually a great read, and includes a great story on Jack Welch, the retiring head of General Electric, an incredibly successful guy who has never forgotten his humble beginnings in Massachusetts, and still gives thanks every day for what he has achieved. Nice symmetry there!
• And other items found by Felicity:
  • Wednesday's Variety had a negative piece on Greenlight, saying the rules were unformed, Matt and Ben's involvement was very light-on and that winners may have no say at all over the finished product.
  • There's a feature story on Billy Bob Thornton in the latest Esquire magazine (US). A few mentions of ATPH, but nothing specific that I could see.
  • Penelope will be on the cover of December's Interview magazine.
  • The Creative Screenwriting issue with a mention of ATPH is good, and compares the book and script versions, including excerpts from the script. The movie should open on a group of horses in the wild, but will lack the obvious descriptive passages and lyricism present in the novel. In summary the script was praised.
• Maria wrote:I think the pictures of Matt in the new TALK issue are great. And offered two of the pics in full size. Here they are:
  Matt reclining on a rock: I believe this is the one that Felicity especially loved.
  A leather-clad, toothy Matt in closeup
• I thank the reader who sent this in:
  In the Nov. 13 issure of US magazine the one with Matt and Will in it, there is a little blurb on page 3. Here's the little article:
  Hey, Ben Get Me Some Game
  Matt Damon was looking for distractions while in Paris filming the Bourne Identity, so he recently called his pal Ben Affleck in the States to ask him to buy a Sony PlayStation 2 for him and ship it to France. Affleck sent an assistant to get two of the $300 units - one for each of the Oscar winners. The assistant waited for four hours at a Fry's electronics store in Burbank, California, before consoles went on sale at midnight on October 25, but they were sold out by the time he reached the clerk. Not to worry. One of Afleck's people called Sony, and two PlayStations were delivered to his L.A. home the next day.

11/13/00
Not a whole lot of news. Val sent in this item:
Ben Affleck is promoting BOUNCE this week beginning with an interview w/ Diane Sawyer this morning on GMA and on PRIMETIME Thursday. [Diane is a HUGE Ben fan]. This morning's talk was a bit subdued, almost sad, as Ben said he felt very sad when he saw BOUNCE recently. He hesitated when Diane asked him why he felt sad. Then she answered that question for him by asking/stating that in the movie, Abby and Buddy have a happy ending, but in real life, Ben and Gwyn don't end up together. I had never seen Ben looking so sullen and emotional in any interview before. He is always mouthing off and joking.
Anyhow there is a possibility Matt may come up in the converation in the Primetime interview. He will also be on Jay Leno on Thursday night. Charlize Theron will be on Leno on Wednesday--she may be promoting THE YARDS this time out. 11/12/00

• If you look in the Miramax "All the Pretty Horses" site, you can find a couple shots from ATPH in the "COMING SOON" window, including a closeup shot of a Matt waring his cowboy hat, looking very handsome.
• I went back to the theater to see Bagger Vance again. Surprisingly, the attendance was not bad at all. Perhaps people weary of the ongoing presidential election drama were returning to the movies. It was good to once again get to see Matt looking so gorgeous on the big silver screen. Saw the ATPH trailer again too, and realized that I missed a lot from the last viewing. The opening scene shows a horse rider - possibly Matt - galloping along a moving truck. There is a scene of Matt and Henry Thomas crossing the Rio Grande, and a shot of a Matt yelling in joy after having crossed it. There is a scene of Matt playing billiard with Alejandra's father, when they first meet. The jail scenes have Matt wearing a dark-green and white striped prison garbs which look to me too clean and neat for the Mexican jail setting. There were quite a few cuts of the post-prison John Grady, and, to my relief, the scarred face doesn't look bad at all, and Matt does not look emaciated in those scenes. There were quite a few cuts of Matt pointing his gun, and contrary to my recollection from the last viewing, there are daytime scenes shown, but the tone, especially when juxtaposed with "Bagger Vance", is subdue and, well, John-Fordish. And the dance scene from which come the still pictures shown above went by all too quickly. Surprisingly, there is very little of Lucas Black shown, and I would have expected to see a lot more horses. I truly hope that the picture is in good hands and will come to us on Christmas in its full splendor.

• Postcard from Felicity:
  • Bagger Vance looks on track for only a $6-7 million second week (came sixth on Friday).
  • It's the weekend for Christmas previews, so here goes. There's nothing new in most of the previews, with most mentioning its oft-delayed release date and long running time. EW has also published its new holiday movie guide.
    From the NY Daily News: ALL THE PRETTY HORSES
    
    Directed by Billy Bob Thornton
    When Oscar-winning screenwriter Ted Tally ("Silence of the Lambs") first read Cormac McCarthy's "All the Pretty Horses" several years ago, he knew he wanted to adapt it for the screen. The 1992 novel, which won the National Book Award, is an elegiac tale of a young cowboy who rides into Mexico in the late 1940s and falls in love with the daughter of a rich landowner.
    The horses aren't all that's pretty in Matt Damon's latest film. Says Tally, "I love it because it's so many different kinds of a story — an adventure story, a love story, a coming-of-age story, and a Western, but a different kind of Western, because it's set in 1949. It's a very rich canvas."
    Mike Nichols originally owned the film rights, and Tally was able to convince him that he was the man to write the screenplay. When Billy Bob Thornton came on as director, he retained Tally and, says the writer, "shot everything I wrote."
    As with all the screenplays he has written (which also include "Before and After" and "White Palace"), the process Tally used to get to a final draft was long and arduous.
    "You have to eliminate supporting characters and subplot, and focus on the main character," says Tally. "The details of the structure and dialogue are secondary to your feelings about this main character and what makes a good story."
    McCarthy wrote his book in the kind of highly stylized language that didn't lend itself to adaptation.
    "There's this soaring, poetic prose, but except where you can find a cinematic image that captures that richness, that language is not of much use to you," says Tally. "Movies don't do too well getting inside character's heads in terms of the stream of consciousness that a book can do."
    Luckily, however, McCarthy's novel is also filled with strong action sequences. And, says Tally, if you're a screenwriter, your eye is drawn to anything that involves action on the screen. Still, there was plenty that had to be cut to avoid what Tally describes as the "fanny-time problem that every movie faces."
    Several sequences featuring the Damon character's dying father were pared down to one. A Mexican prison warden who plays a key role in the book was eliminated. Tally says he wished he had had "more space to work with the love story, which only forms a part of the movie. But that's kind of inherent in the plot."
    He says he's pleased with the final result, however.
    "'All the Pretty Horses' is the greatest book I've adapted as a work of literature," he says. "And I think it's my favorite of all my screenplays."
  • There's a Ben profile in Boston Globe (Bounce out next week), but it says nothing new.
• My comments:
  The low boxoffice take of Bagger Vance is to be expected. But I think the film will hang round and quietly draw a few millions each weekend. It was a low-budget production, relatively speaking, and so if nothing else it will break even. Let's face it, it's an artsy film. Also, with all the turmoil in this country this past week, the core audience for BV (older people) probably did not go to theaters.
  • I was disappointed, and somewhat alarmed, that there is no poster for the movie in these previews, including in the LA Times. The LA Times did include a picture of Matt and penelope dancing (see above) on the first page, but there's only a little mentioning of the film itself inside, to the effect of "let's see if Harvey Weinstein can pull off a winner from this long-delayed film." Click here to see the article.
• We have seen this article before, but this time Matt is explicitly mentioned - this one showed up on Mr. Show Biz:
  Lee Slams Smith for 'Driving Mr. Damon'
  At a Harvard panel on race on Monday, Spike Lee criticized Will Smith for agreeing to play a mystical caddy to Matt Damon's golden boy in The Legend of Bagger Vance.
  According to the New York Post, Lee referred to the movie as "Driving Mr. Damon" for painting such a pretty picture of racial relations in the Depression-era South.
  In real life, black men were being "castrated and lynched left and right," the Boston Globe quotes Lee as saying. "With all that going on, why are you [expletive] trying to teach Matt Damon a golf swing?"
  Could it be that Lee is still miffed that Smith chose to back Michael Mann, instead of Lee, as the director for Ali?
  Smith told Mr. Showbiz in a recent interview that he couldn't initially get past the "Yes, sirs" his character had to say in the script, but finally decided that the role and the story were intriguing enough for him to commit. The Robert Redford movie has so far seen so-so reviews and middling box-office business.
  Lee made similar criticisms earlier.
• Tish's take on the cover story in the current issue of Talk magazine:
  Just finished the Talk article and was amazed at how YOUNG Matt looks. I'm talking Rising Son kind of young! Hard to believe he was almost 30 when those shots were taken. Personally, I think it's time to get over the fresh-faced ingenue look and move on to something a bit more mature. As for the article ... a lot less depth than I would have liked, but I imagine he (and his PR machine) can dictate a lot of content. There's something hidden about that boy.

• Picked up a copy of "Talk". Folks, the cover photo is a lot better in print than the one shown above (currently on talkmagazine.com). In print, there is more texture, and so you could really see Matt's skin, blemishes and all. But the best part is his eyes: you could really see the blue in them and the livliness and alertness of Matt do come through. He's looking right at you. It is, as Liz Smith put it, a wonderful picture. Not a pretty-boy shoot, but more of a up-close candid shot. Inside, there are two full-page facial spreads, and one full page photo of Matt, seated and leaning back on what looks like a granite deck. Matt has on the same white Tee as in the cover photo, and blue jeans with rolled-up bottoms. And he is barefeet. In fact, his feet are prominent, as the camera was aimed upward. I am on page 3 of the article now, and one more full page photo, of a smiling Matt (all teeth) with his chin rested on his hands. He is wearing black-leather - oh yes, that's the small pic shown above - again, much better on paper. A bonus is a small still photo from ATPH, with Matt and Penelope standing/seated side by side - and they are dressed in the same outfit as in the dance photo currently on my site.
  It goes without my saying that this issue is not to be missed.

  Notables in the writeup:

  • Matt is quoted as saying: "The four-hour version of (ATPH) is the best movie I've seen in my entire life."
  • Ben is quoted thus: "Matt is like, I won't say anything and I won't do anything, so that I can't get hurt. I'll just be really nice and pleasant, and then nobody will be able to get to me."
  • His pad in New York is 3 hours' train-ride away from his family in Boston.
  • Matt on ATPH: "I wish I could do that movie forever. I mean, that was incredible, that experience. I don't know what will happen. I just know that I have never felt that way about anything ever before.
    TALK: Why is that?
    MATT: I've never ben that surprised by something when I saw it. I was there everyday. I was there for every shot: I looked through the lens. The movie really affected me, just genuinely surprised me. Billy snapped me out of a lot of bad habits.
  • Matt said he was "like a last-minute replacement" for his role in "The Rainmaker."
  • TALK: Seems like you spent quite a few pre-Good Will Hunting years scrambling. Did you turn anything down?
    Matt: I didn't audition for TV. And I turned down The Quick and the Dead; clearly it really derailed Leonardo's career. [Laughter]
  • At one point Matt got a phone call that Leo DeCaprio had taken the part in ATPH, and he "was shocked because everyone was saying he's gonna pass." "I was just crestfallen." Then two weeks later he got another call and was told that Leo has passed. He said he was jumping up and down.
  • Matt met Dicaprio at a reading after he's made ATPH, and asked Leo why he passed up on ATPH. Leo's answer was, "Ahh, you know. You just pass on some things; it wasn't for me."
• Felicity's finds:
  • Greenlight update, from Entertainment News Daily (it's basically a press release, but):
    Greenlight's a Go - Thousands Submit Scripts to World's Largest Active Online Screenwriting Community
    LOS ANGELES, Nov. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- Project Greenlight, a first-of-its-kind venture from Miramax Films & TV, HBO and LivePlanet, received entries from more than 10,000 people during its four-week screenplay submission phase, it was announced today by Chris Moore, CEO of LivePlanet, and Billy Campbell, president of Miramax Television. The instant success of Project Greenlight makes it the largest active screenwriting community in the world, with more than 40,000 members who joined at www.projectgreenlight.com. The Greenlight community and executives are poised to begin the process of selecting a winning script.
    "When we made 'Good Will Hunting,' people were fascinated by the story about how Matt and Ben were taken out of nowhere and got to make the movie they wrote. It will be an interesting plot to show what happens when we give a similar chance to someone new," said Chris Moore. "We have guaranteed that we will make the winning script into a film, but Greenlight is even more than that. Greenlight is a community where filmmakers can read each other's work, share experiences and collaborate with one another. That all adds up to the discovery of a lot of good ideas, helping out a lot of people."
    "Although the submission portion of the contest has come to an end, the real fun of the Greenlight experience is just getting started," said Billy Campbell, president of Miramax Television. "The Greenlight community will rally behind one script or another, and those writers will be in the spotlight -- characters will soon begin to emerge, and real-life plots will thicken. All of this means that the Greenlight community will have the opportunity to participate in a revolutionary process -- both in the documentary and on film."
    In the next phase of the contest, the Greenlight community will narrow the contestant pool from over 10,000 to 250. Members of the Greenlight community, both contestants and registered reviewers, will evaluate and provide feedback on the screenplays; these evaluations will determine the final 250 screenplays in the contest. Because each amateur filmmaker who submits a script must review at least three others, each script will have received at least three peer reviews. After the winner is selected, all other screenwriters will get to see the feedback given to their script.
    "Greenlight will be giving the aspiring filmmakers in the contest attention they would not have received otherwise -- Matt and I feel that that the karma of that is really appropriate given how we launched our careers with 'Good Will Hunting,'" said Ben Affleck, co-founder of LivePlanet and an executive producer of the Greenlight film. "Everyone in the contest gets feedback on their work, and the scripts that make it to the final rounds can be read by thousands of people-who knows who might be paying attention? Greenlight can take access to filmmaking out of the hands of seven executives in a Hollywood boardroom and put it into the hands of people everywhere who love movies."
    Amateur screenwriters aged 18 years and older were invited to submit their original screenplays electronically to www.projectgreenlight.com from September 25 through October 22. Not only will Matt Damon, Ben Affleck and Chris Moore executive produce this film, but Miramax is providing the winning contestant or team with a $1 million production budget, hiring them to direct the film, and guaranteeing to distribute the film in theatres. At the same time, Miramax Television is chronicling the making of the movie in a 13-episode television documentary series that will take an insider's look at the moviemaking process, slated to air on HBO in Winter 2002. " We couldn't be happier about our first collaboration with HBO," said Billy Campbell, president of Miramax Television. "The series will give millions of people a chance to be a part of this exciting experience."
  • Here's the byline on the Talk cover-story: Headed for Home. Five years in Hollywood have left Matt Damon rich, famous, footloose, fancy-free—and alone. Now, with the release of All the Pretty Horses, he's moving back east. By Chris Connelly
  • Remember that story that Matt was supposed to do Vanity Fair this month but turned it down for Talk? Isn't it funny that Jude Law got the VF cover instead. Also there was the story that Penelope was meant to be in the cover as well (Talk). Well, she's not there.
  • Us Weekly magazine has a holiday and Oscar previews in their latest issue.
• Val sent this in:
  ''Silent Bob'' on Dimension's summer slate
  By Jonathan Bing
  NEW YORK (Variety) - The final episode of Kevin Smith's New Jersey chronicles, ``Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back,'' is slated for a national release from Dimension Films on Aug. 10.
  Ben Affleck and Matt Damon are in talks to appear in the pic, as part of an ensemble cast that also features Smith, Jason Mewes, Jason Lee, Brian O'Halloran and Jeff Anderson. All are veterans of Smith's View Askew label, having appeared in one or more of the New Jersey saga's previous installments, ``Clerks,'' ``Chasing Amy'' and ``Mall Rats.''
  Production will begin in January in L.A. The plot is still under wraps, but the picture will be produced by Smith and his View Askew partner Scott Mosier. The two were exec producers of ``Good Will Hunting.''
  Reuters/Variety REUTERS

• Today's Liz Smith Column in the Los Angeles Times:

  In New York, No Rest for Damon

  New York - Short shots: Please, won't somebody give Matt Damon a place to sleep? The cover of Talk magazine has Damon, wonderfully photographed by Oliviero Toscani, quoted: "I literally have nowhere to sleep." Damon is only now finally getting a place of his own, in New York city.
• NR wrote:
  In this month's issue of Creative Screenwriting with Samuel L. Jackson and Bruce Willis on the cover, there are script reviews for The Legend of Bagger Vance and All the Pretty Horses. The photos are the same usual suspects, but, its seems the reviewer might have like Pretty Horses better than Bagger.
• And K&J sent this in:
  Here's the link to an article on Matt in USA Weekend.

• Latest from Felicity:
  • This is interesting. Mark Wahlberg has now started to air his frustrations about Matt. From an article with the London Daily Telegraph:
    The womanising is, Wahlberg maintains, grossly exaggerated. "My mom called me up because she read that I took Jennifer Aniston [who plays his girlfriend in the heavy-metal movie] away from Brad Pitt, and he was sneaking on to the set to see if I'm in her trailer. She's screaming at me, 'What the hell are you doing - you leave that guy's girlfriend alone!' She read it in the National Enquirer. She believes everything. I got more shit for supposedly stealing Winona Ryder from Matt Damon."
    The name of Damon (just a year older than Wahlberg and a fellow Bostonian, but from the right side of the tracks) sends him off on a new and surprisingly caustic rap.
    "He doesn't want to be a Hollywood movie star. He wants to have been to jail, and say he's tough. He's very lucky he didn't have to grow up in Dorchester - he was close enough to know what it's like and to be able to play it in a movie without having had to experience it."
  • To continue the theme, here's Spike Lee trashing Bagger Vance, from the Boston Globe:
    Spike Lee's guide to making friends
    Add Will Smith to the growing list of people not likely to join Spike Lee courtside at a New Yorks Knicks game. At a Monday night forum on race and the media at Harvard University, Lee appeared pained when discussing Smith's new film, ''The Legend of Bagger Vance.'' Smith plays a Yoda-like golf guru who helps Matt Damon 's character overcome flaws in his game. The film is set in the early 1930s, a time when black men were being ''castrated and lynched left and right,'' Lee said. ''With all that going on, why are you [expletive] trying to teach Matt Damon a golf swing?'' Also on that aforementoned list: Cuba Gooding Jr., Ving Rhames , and Michael Clarke Duncan.
  • I thought you need to know the French title for ATPH: De si jolis chevaux, while The Rainmaker was L'Idealiste.
• Hear, hear - a few reviews posted on IMDB:
  • Date: 5 November 2000
    Summary: Beautiful
    This movie is beautiful in every way, and beautiful is not a word I use a lot. The cinematography is masterful, of course, but there is more to the core of this movie then I think some critics are giving it credit for. "It is a game that cannot be won, only played." What a great way to approach life. To say this movie is like a supermodel, pretty but empty, is to completely miss the point of the movie. The beauty is its heart and its message. It is touching in a completely understated way, just like life.
  • Date: 6 November 2000
    Summary: A wonderful film.
    THE LEGEND OF BAGGER VANCE may not be for everybody. In today's movie world where explosions mean more than characters, BAGGER VANCE is an exceptional film. It contains three great starring performances- from Will Smith, Matt Damon and Charlize Theron and has a wonderful visual look thanks to director Robert Redford and cinematographer Michael Ballhaus. The ending is a little unsatisfying, but the movie as a whole is a wonderful, warm hearted, beautiful film. A sure-fired Oscar contender.
  • Date: 7 November 2000
    Summary: "Bagger" has a lot going for it...
    I enjoyed "The Legend of Bagger Vance" very much. I read the book about a year ago, and while the movie varies from the book in many instances, the overall theme of the book carries through into the movie.
    The beginning of the movie disturbed me, as it seemed a bit rushed and disjointed. Once you get past the introduction (the first 30 minutes or so) the movie is great. The photography, music, and scenery are beautiful. The actors all did a good job. Unlike some other reviewers, I felt like all the actors handled their roles well. Will Smith pulls off Bagger Vance with just the right mixture of humor and sincerity. Matt Damon as Ranulf Junnah is much as I imagined him in the book. The "chemistry" between Damon and Theron seemed appropriate given the storyline and the characters' past history. I was especially impressed with J. Michael Moncrief in the role of Young Hardy and with Gretsch and McGill who play Jones and Hagen "to a tee."
    I would rate this movie an 8/10...but the 2nd half of it is a 10/10 in my opinion. Enjoy!
• News from Val:
  • There is a full page photo of the BAGGER VANCE threesome in US Weekly.
  • Not a very complimentary review of BV from Sporting News: 'Bagger Vance' takes its swings, but only shoots par

• What an incredible election night we have had. Over there in Paris I imagine Matt was following it however. I know I am exhausted.
• Felicity found a bunch of news on "Pretty Horses", which whets my idea further more.
  • From the Chicago Sun-Times:
    PRETTY LONG: It may be called "All the Pretty Horses," but they couldn't say whoa. Matt Damon's Tex-Mex holiday Western used to clock in at a saddle-sore three hours--not that its star ever minded.
    After a yearlong delay and a studio switch from Columbia to Miramax, Damon is upfront about the fate of the screen adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's book. "I know it won't be for everybody. I don't care," Damon says, defending his un-Hollywood "Horses," which co-stars Penelope Cruz and Henry Thomas. He calls the movie "an experience. . . . If you broke down the story of `Pretty Horses,' it's about the feeling of it and not the plot," he says.
    At three hours, maybe there was too much feeling. When the film is released at the end of the year its running time will be reduced by a third. "I don't think the studio thought the average person could sit through three hours," he says. Damon says someday audiences will see the extended version of "Horses." "When the DVD comes out, you can see the three-hour version."
    "[Miramax] can market it the best," Damon said. As for the box office, he says, "Look at [director Billy Bob Thornton's] `Sling Blade.' It wasn't a $200 million hit at the box office. This is an art-house movie. Billy is like, `I make one kind of movie.' "
    And this will be a clean kind of movie. Book fans might remember a chapter where Damon's character rides a horse in the buff. "Um, the horse is still nude in the movie," says Damon who jokingly tells fans, "Get your mind out of the gutter."
  • If we're following box office, BV did $11.5 for the weekend (they nicely overestimated the predictions), and $0.78 yesterday, for a total of $12.23 million so far.
  • This was one of the stories from the NY Daily News:
    A 'Horse' Opera at Miramax
    Hoofbeats stampeding through the movie "All the Pretty Horses" are getting louder.
    The film, starring Matt Damon and Penelope Cruz in a story based on the first novel in Cormac McCarthy's "Border Trilogy," has occupied an important slot in the Hollywood rumor mill since last year. Stories abound about the battle of wills between the director, Billy Bob Thornton, and Harvey Weinstein, whose Miramax Films will release the film on Christmas Day.
    Depending on the sources you talk to, the movie is too long, not commercial enough, doesn't have enough romance between the two stars, or is a masterpiece about the disappearance of the Old West.
    Just last week, Thornton was overheard in a heated cell phone conversation with Weinstein, sparking a new round of buzz on the Left Coast.
    Thornton, who is in Oregon working on the Barry Levinson movie "Bandits" with co-star Bruce Willis, says it's all part of the process. "The studio always wants to make it more commercial, while the director is going for something artsy, and this is no different. Harvey and I have our stuff all the time. He wants to do this, I want to do that, and somehow we meet in the middle.
  • In the other story Weinstein said that Matt feels it's his best performance (Horses).
  • A small item in Heat magazine notes the size of Will's trailer for Bagger Vance, which had a recording studio and a lounge for 20 people. Matt is quoted as saying "It was four times as big as my apartment in New York."
• I got some enqueries about the "All the Pretty Horses" trailer that I mentioned. It seems that the trailer is not shown with all screenings of "Bagger Vance." I am sure it's just a matter of time that it will be everywhere. But for your curiosity, here's my impression of the trailer.
  Spoiler warning!
  Truth be told, I can't be held accountable for the accuracy of my description, as I was pretty much reduced to a knot of nerves as soon as I saw the words "Miramax Presents". It had occurred to me, after having already sat through two other big-feature previews, that they would be showing ATPH, and of course ATPH is jointly produced by Miramax and Columbia. Next thing I knew the Columbia logo came on, and I knew for sure that it has to be ATPH.
  It went by very quickly. But my recollection is that the whole thing had a gritty, solemn tone to it. There was a lot of sky, river, and open land. Having read the book, I recognized all of the scenes immediately, some of which I have played out in my mind often. In particular, the scene of John Grady Cole (Matt's character)'s first encounter with Alejandra (Penelope Cruz) is very much the way I imagined. There's Matt, cowboy hat and blue jeans and all, riding on a dark horse, and he turns around to look once, then swirls his horse around to look once more, his gaze fixed on the sight of a beauty, also on horseback, who has just passed by.
  There was also a quick shot of a dance scene. Then we are given a glimpse of the most tentalizing scene from the book, of the two young lovers' illicit midnight rendezvous in the river. Also shown is a cut from a torrid love scene in a very dark room, with John Grady declaring his undying love for Alejandra.
  If you have read the book, you know what will happen. Don't read on if you don't want to have the movie spoiled for you.
  There after came a cut of the scene where Alejandra's aunt spoke to John Grady about "the honor of a woman", followed by a startled John Grady roused from his bed by a posse sent from Alejandra's father. We are also shown cuts from the prison scenes, incluing a brief glimpse of the knife fight. After which we see a shot of the John Grady who survived the ordeal, his face scared and his eyes flinty.
  I can't remember if they showed the scene of the sad reunion of John Grady and Alejandra, but I do remember that the trailer ends with a cut which showed Matt, all alone, in a deserted landscape, set againt a night sky, followed by the words "Opening on Christmas."
  It's a very haunting trailer. You can sense the expansiveness of the scenary, and the intensity of the emotion. Rumors are that the film is still being trimmed to come under 2 hours. I hope they don't end up butchering it, for this film really has the potential of greatness.

• Election day. Please vote.
• Excellent Reuters article sent in by Val. See it here, excerpted below:
  Entertainment Headlines
  Saturday November 4 5:17 PM ET
  Weekend Movies: Calling on 'Angels' And a 'Bagger'
  By Bob Tourtellotte
  LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Moviegoers received a big blast from the past and a little lift from heaven as female friendly action flick ``Charlie's Angels'' opened in theaters alongside Robert Redford's spiritual drama, ``The Legend of Bagger Vance.''
  It's no big mystery that action movies get made because teenage guys, who are among Hollywood's biggest customers, love seeing muscled-up actors firing guns and blowing up bad guys. But movies like ``Bagger Vance'' get made because they are really trying to say something to audiences -- young and old.
  ``Bagger Vance'' is one of those very pretty Hollywood movies with the big-name actors and sweeping landscapes and wonderful costumes and inspiring music like other recent Redford films such as ``The Horse Whisperer'' or ``A River Runs Through It.''
  The movie has a message, too, and it is delivered by Will Smith as Bagger, a sort of angel sent from heaven to steer a young World War I veteran onto a path of self-redemption.
  The veteran, played by Matt Damon, is Rannulph Junnuh who had been a favorite son of Savannah, Ga., and a top flight amateur golfer before the war shattered his sense of himself.
  ``It's the classic journey of a hero who falls into darkness through some disconnect with his soul, and then comes back into the light with the help of a spiritual guide,'' said Redford, who directed the film but does not appear in it.
  Ten years after the war is over, a disillusioned Junnuh returns to Savannah, but the Great Depression has begun and the town has lost its own sense of pride.
  One of Savannah's wealthiest citizens has built a golf course on the outskirts of town, but it nearly bankrupts him in the process and leads him to take his own life.
  Lost Swing And Lost Love
  To save the course from ruin, the owner's daughter, Adele Invergordon, (Charlize Theron) decides to hold a challenge match between two of the golf's legendary players, Bobby Jones and Walter Hagen. But to hold the match, the town's leaders force her to come up with a local player to include. Junnuh's the man for the game, but the problem is, he doesn't play anymore.
  Junnuh and Invergordon were once lovers, but the war ended their affair. So, not only must Junnuh regain his golf swing, but he also must cope with a lost love.
  Of course, it's Bagger who comes into his life to help him reconcile his past with the future that lays ahead.
  For moviegoers who don't want to think too much, however,
  there's ``Charlie's Angels,'' based on the 1970s television show of the same name and starring Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore and Lucy Liu.
  While the angels aren't as muscle bound -- thank goodness -- as a Keanu Reeves or Bruce Willis and while they have vowed not to use guns, there should be plenty of kung fu fights and high-tech special effects to thrill action aficionados. And the message these ``Angels'' bring to moviegoers is to just have some fun and laugh a little. ...
• Postcard from Val:
  ... I saw BV on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday!
  The man (Matty, that is :-) is absolutely breathtaking! He never ceases to win me over with each role. The way he immerses himself into his character is just incredible. I doubt he even realizes his own talent genius--certainly those WORTHLESS critics who have attacked him have no eye whatsoever (okay, so I'm being protective!)
  I must give kudos to Will Smith who was simply terrific as Bagger. He managed to keep his comedic nature to a minimum and was so endearing, even mesmerizing in places. The little boy, for having had no acting experience, was great as well. And what about Charlize's clothes and impeccable makeup. Good Lord! She was simply beautiful in every frame--beautiful in that Southern way!
  Redford and his cinematographer did an amazing job of framing shots and landscapes--just beautiful. As for the story, I completely GOT IT! I was so taken with the message and was so moved in places--ie. Matt faces his memories of the war in the woods--. I so pity those people who just didn't take the 'message' out of the theater with them.
  The audiences at the showing I saw were overwhelmingly older. Mostly couples and a alot of mature women. I did notice a sprinking of boys--
  I was surprised to read that the ATPH trailer was out in California theaters. I am soooo jealous. The 'big' trailers attached to BV was BOUNCE and Men of Honor.
  BTW/ If any of you have been involved in the presidential election coverage, Ben along with 10-12 other celebs appeared at South Beach rally for Gore last night. The production was orchestrated by ol' Harvey Weinstein who called on Affleck, Bob DeNiro, Bon Jovi, Stevie Wonder, Deidre Hall, Baby Face, et al. Live coverage was on CSPAN. Ben also made phone calls to Florida voters throughout the day urging them to vote. When he was interviewed, he made some less than gracious political comments (which I can't respect him for doing). Anyway, there's little doubt that Matt would have been up on that stage had he been stateside. Okay, all, give me your impressions as to why Hollywood supports the Democratic party so loudly! I know there is alot more than just the concept of a democracy going on here--I have my own ideas but I'd like to hear what you think and know especially those of you living in California/NY.
  All for now. Val
  My responses: I pride myself on being objective, and I will say that in the hands of any number of other actors, the role would have been a joke. Think Ben, for example. The ire from the few critics who did pick on Matt has to do with his being miscast, or his being too pretty (frankly, jealousy is very obvious in some of these cases.)
  I think these young actors all put their heart and soul into the movie for Redford. It's reassuring that every one of them has been put down by one critic or another - it's not just Matt
  >Redford and his cinematographer did an amazing job of framing shots and landscapes--just beautiful.
  Again, agreed. It's reminiscient of Gus Van Zant. You can totally sense how much a director cares about the actor, as compared to one who's indifferent (Spileberg, John Dahl, in my opinion). Redford let us see the actors' reaction shots, instead of concentrating on the action and the scenery - and that makes all the difference.
  >As for the story, I completely GOT IT! I was so taken with the message and was so moved in places--ie. Matt faces his memories of the war in the woods--. I so pity those people who just didn't take the 'message' out of the theater with them.
  Supposedly people coming out of the theater consider the message "shallow" - by the admission of a Dreamworks rep. I must admit that that was my initial reaction, dating from when I first read the book. But thinking about the film has made me see it in a different light - I admit that my opinion might have been helped because Matt was shown so well.
• Felicity sent in this abbreviated report after accidentally losing a long message :(
  • From an interview with Cole Hauser(GWH costar):
    What's it like having Ben Affleck and Matt Damon as friends?
    They're great friends of mine. I respect a lot of what they do and they respect what I do. Obviously they're on the 'space train' and it's wonderful to see your friends do well.
    Would you ever want to become that famous?
    I try not think too much about it if it's not happening. If you do the work you'll eventually end up where you should be. I hope this film gives me the opportunity to showcase myself in leading roles. If 'Pitch Black' gives me that, it will be wonderful.
  • There have been a few stories on ATPH in the NY Daily News in recent days. Usual possible problems/denials/everything going to be OK stuff we keep hearing about. Everyone's still saying it's going to come in at around two hours.
  • Watch out for Talk and Cowboys and Indians magazines this week or next.
  • From Variety
    HOLLYWOOD (Variety) - Producer Frank Marshall is newly set as exec producer on Universal's ``The Bourne Identity'' starring Matt Damon and Franka Potente (``Run Lola Run'').
    Helmed by Doug Liman (``Go''), pic is an adaptation of a Robert Ludlum novel about a wounded amnesia victim who discovers he's trailed by assassins.
    Principal photography began last week in Paris.
  • In the NY Daily News today, a line that Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman saw a session of BV at the weekend.
• A Big Matt Fan wrote:
  One place on the web where BAGGER rates well is on moviefone.com, the popular service used to check times and purchase tickets. Last time I looked, it had an A- rating from moviegoers, which isn't bad at all...
• Here's a review posted on the Internet Movie Database Site that I do agree with:
  If you think this movie was really about golf....
  ...then you need to go back and watch it again. This beautifully shot movie uses the game of golf as an analogy for life and coming to grips with one's past. Rannulph Junuh, a local golf hero (played by Matt Damon), returns home from the Great War, the only survivor of his company. Unable to shake the horrors of war, he becomes a recluse, attempting to drown his pain in whiskey and alienating all he loves, including his former girlfriend, played by Charlize Theron. It is only through the intervention of a young aspiring golfer (J. Michael Moncrief) and the mysterious new caddy, Bagger Vance (Will Smith), that Junuh faces his fears and starts actively playing the game of life again. In addition to the lush cinematography, the actors were well cast and gave strong and colorful performances. The musical score, written by Rachel Portman, was entertaining in its own right, in addition to perfectly complimenting the film's 1930s setting. I look forward to hearing more of her work. I highly recommend this movie to anyone who's feeling a little disillusioned - the feeling you'll leave the theater with is more than worth the ticket price.
• Excerpts from an article in the Boston Herald.
  `Caddyshack' links all of the best golf movies Movies/by Paul C. McLean
  Monday, November 6, 2000
  ...
  Now Matt Damon is stepping to the tee as Rannulph Junuh in ``The Legend of Bagger Vance.'' Will Smith is his caddie, the title character, and the film is from the director Robert Redford.
  What ``Bagger Vance'' does remarkably well is communicate the passion many golfers feel for the game, and the idealized view they have of it (the one in which Tiger Woods was always welcome at Augusta).
  Golf is almost a religion, with former Ryder Cup captain Ben Crenshaw perhaps its high priest. The opponents in ``Bagger Vance'' are intense rivals on the course, moral opposites off it, but models of sportsmanship through it all. Jack Lemmon, perhaps avenging his careerlong torture at Pebble Beach, gets to revel in Junuh's glory as the narrator. Most important, the golf course is a beautiful thing, and golf a beautiful game, in director Redford's hands.
  Of course, it all may add up to a metaphorical shank to any nongolfer.
  The fairways of the film's Georgia island course carry echoes of Redford's ``The Natural'' and ``A River Runs Through It,'' but even ``Bagger Vance'' owes something to ``Caddyshack.''
  You can spot an uncouth Rodney Dangerfield in ``Bagger'' 's Walter Hagen, some Ted Knight blowhard in its Savannah pols, and a whole lot of Chevy Chase's Ty Webb in both Bagger and Junuh.
  And think of the story line: the untested kid taking on the established players, helped along the path to enlightenment and in keeping it on the fairway by something of a mystical being, a Zen master strolling the Cartpath of Least Resistance.
  Damon even learned to play golf for the film, and his swing isn't bad. But forget that ``authentic swing'' business, Matt. Just be the ball. It's all you need to know. Be the ball.

• From The Box Office Guru: Opening in third place with an estimated $12M was the Will Smith-Matt Damon golf drama The Legend of Bagger Vance. Directed by Robert Redford, the DreamWorks release teed off in 2,061 theaters and averaged a solid $5,822. In Bagger Vance, Smith plays a caddie who helps a war hero, played by Damon, compete in a prestigious tournament. Reviews were mixed for the PG-13 film which arrived a bit below Redford's last directorial effort, The Horse Whisperer, which opened with $13.7M in May 1998 with a $6,712 average and went on to gross $75.4M domestically. Also starring Charlize Theron, Bagger Vance will be released by Fox overseas.
• I disagree with the assessment of the film, but this line appeared in one of the reviews of BV on the Internet Movie Data Base site:
  Partway through the film, I realized that it wasn't going to get any better, and I decided to focus on the eye candy, namely Matt Damon (and Charlize Theron is undoubtably a reason for any man to see this film).
• Another cute line from another web-posted review, which I happen to agree:
  "One thing that didn't grow on me was this one particular continuity issue which just bothered me throughout. If Matt Damon's character was supposed to have been this great golfer back in the day, why is it that when he returns to the game all those years later, he is still decades younger than the top golfers of that time? The fact that Damon's character was this aged golfer who didn't look a day over 25 just struck me as very odd and somewhat distracting. Or was that just me?"
  I too noticed the inconsistency. Considering that Junah was supposed to have been a recluse for 12 years, Matt should look at least in his late 30s, but, as this reviewer said, he doesn't look a day older than 25. In fact, there seemingly wasn't any effort to age either Matt or Charlize - they look the same at the beginning and in the end, when over 20 years supposedly have intervened.
  That said, I am very grateful nevertheless, because Matt couldn't have looked better in this film.
• While watching Ebert's review of Bagger Vance (of which more will be said), it occurred to me that there perhaps is a good reason for the age inconsistency mentioned above. Redford is not stupid, and it would not have taken very much effort to take care of the age. But the story is told from the eyes of a 10 year old who idolized the Junah character. And so, in his eyes, Junah (and his girl) didn't age. To the little boy, he stood out from the others, hence Matt looks twentish while the other golfers look to be the age of his father. This would also explain Matt's wardrobe. To the little fellow, Matt's character IS God-like and glamorous.

  It turns out that Roper, Ebert's partner on his show, didn't care for BV at all, and called it a big disappointment. To which Ebert retorted that he "loved this movie", and went on to point out that it is an allegory of life, and that the movie struck a chord with him and cast a spell. When asked just what was it that BV told to Matt's character that made sense, Ebert unhesitatingly said it was that "you don't win at playing golf, you just play' (paraphase mine). And now that I think about it, that does ring true: In the game of life, no one wins either, we just play - live, and try to enjoy the moment.

• A concerned Felicity wrote:
  There's an incredibly vitriolic attack on BV at the Washington Post today. In an very nasty piece, this is the sole reason to mention it: "Damon looks superb in the role, like something out of a J.C. Leyendecker advertisement for Arrow shirts, lean-jawed and lush-haired in flattering period plus fours and caps, his socks argyle, his tie knotted tight, his brow sweatless, his eyes narrow, his unflappability extraordinary. As a consequence, he's a kind of godlike figure, beloved and glamorous, who quite naturally is awarded (and deserves) the adoration of Adele Invergordon (Charlize Theron), daughter of the richest man in Savannah and prime beauty of the South."
  [It goes on to say Matt destroys the movie, and includes this phrase among its less stinging remarks: perhaps the best way to sum it up is to say that "The Legend of Bagger Vance" seems like something put together by a very stupid but powerful person to whom nobody had the nerve to say: No.]
  To which I responed:
  I read that piece too. My impression is that the writer was making fun of the very preppy costumes that Matt was given to wear in the movie, but the venom was directed towards Redford - surely it's not Matt's idea to dress himself up, and we who have seen that black sweater all too much can only imagine how uncomfortable it must have been for Matt to be wearing shirt and tie during the filming. I will have to say that it is rather ridiculous for this supposedly down-and-out character to have such a downright preppy wardrobe. As I said, even when he was supposedly in his drunken stupor, Matt's outfit was designer stuff. BTW he was very appealing in that scene where Charlize's character tried to seduce him into signing up for the tournament. But then the next we see him he is wearing the blue denim Redford outfits. It's very incongruent. But, hey, what a treat to us.
  BTW Matt was in just about every frame of that ATPH preview that I saw. Also, come to think about it - considerin