The Films of Alexander Payne - C/D

I guess my issue isn't with what he's doing/done in terms of career being abt. white people woes, it's that he's selected four books to adapt (Citizen Ruth is original, right?) and the six or seven lead parts in each of them – save his ex-wife's – are all pretty similar. Google tells me that Payne went to UCLA and lived in Spain, so I think it's a little disingenuous to claim he's just doing 'what he knows' b/c at some point in his European and Angeleno life he has to interact w/ a lot of different people.

Also I've enjoyed all five(?) of his films, to varying degrees.

Maybe his own knowledge of Spain is superficial...?

i dont care if his movies only have economically comfortable white people in them, i like lots of stories about economically comfortable white ppl

some of my best friends are economically comfortable white people

ah who am i kidding, all of them are

heard he's adapting the 'first world problems' meme into his next droll character study

when super-white whit stillman made a film about spain the results were not so great (at least compared to his other films)

white stillman, amirite

i think there is disagreement on that point, but barcelona is my least favorite stillman, too

spanish people are white btw

He got worse with each film.

o u last days of disco haters >:[

My grandfather's side of the family is Asturian, and they would be quite upset if you thought them non-white.

i like last days

i think "spain" represents something other than middle-america whitebread, i don't think anyone was claiming spaniards as people of color

oh i was just being annoying i love whit stillman! and movies about white people!

I would love to watch Alexander Payne's version of Othello

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~rigenweb/stones1/StillmanWhite.jpg

^ whit stillman's grand uncle iirc

Othello, Nebraska:

Nick Nolte as Othello
Peter Fonda as Iago
Swoowie Kurtz as Desdemona
Jared Hess as Cassio
Conor Oberst as Rodrigo

^^^ would actually be the worst film ever made

i do think what i find irritating about sideways is treating white middle-class men's interest in wine and women who are prettier than they are as so fucking fascinating, but the white middle-class part is probably a red herring. i don't know to articulate what i dislike about that movie i'd probably have to watch it again and that's not going to happen.

whit stillman is way better than this guy. last days of disco 4e.

if you didn't enjoy last days of disco you should have just danced through it, it is jiving

lol now why tf would this alexander payne thread be going off on a quiet sunday afternoon

its raining outside!!!

raining racism

a torrential downpour of white privilege

icey who do u think is more racist: alexander payne or paul simon?

i said he made white films for white people, people objected, we caviled, nobody had much heart or stake so the discussion crawled under the jungle gym where it's sullenly drawing in the dirt with a stick

blame it on the payne

haha

Hey, that's my stick.

fwiw i don't object to the assertion that his movies are largely populated with and consumed by omg white people, i just feel like singling this one guy out (i guess because most of the comparable contemporaries are commercially successful enough that studios think it necessary to shoehorn a sassy black friend into their flicks) for the "super-whiteness of his oeuvre" is kind of a loaded and strangely tacky way to address the generally complex and worthwhile subject of race in contemporary film

although i guess we can tackle the insufficiency of his writing for female characters by saying his movies are mega-penile or something

superwhite mega-penile

the milieu depicted in the film is obnoxious, but i remember enjoying sideways and thinking it was pretty funny.

i didn't mean to turn you on, alfred

i'm nothing if not loaded and tacky, it's true

http://jkrbooks.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83451af1569e2010535d69fd7970c-800wi

"Remember when I asked that black guy if he liked Sideways?"-Liz Lemon, hyperwhite.

like it's a good point, some dude, that AP's no worse than a lot of his peers. but there's something more blatant? tossed-off? about race, society, gender, whatever, in payne's films that is espesh irksome to me. david lynch as well. just a casually all-white cast in movies that are supposed to be about, you know, the all-caps American experience.

feel like paynes films are p blatantly abt 'white culture' - like i somewhat give them a pass for their verisimilitude - not that its not in some sense stylized and ott - theyre just you know v observant and cutting - tho i dont doubt that irl thered be more not white people living the lyfe depicted in the films

let's go through his movies and pick out the characters that should clearly have been played by actors of color

should prob have its own board tbh

i love black payne

but you don't understand, that's the name of my dog

http://nyc3img.soundclick.com/27/images/b/band/blackpayne.jpg?version=107

http://c2.ac-postto.myspacecdn.com/postto01/1/3d44e284aadc4e5cac47ed800fcf199a/s.jpg

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fGX28fcdCsI/TbiZ3H7OZiI/AAAAAAAAVug/A-NjuHEdHIc/s1600/Tyler-Perrys-House-of-Payne.jpg

lol

http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6136/6019991227_7b34110b5d.jpg via flickr

Saw "The Holdovers." I thought it was really well directed and acted, but the story and writing ultimately didn't transcend its more familiar/predictable beats.

Yeah my take too. Also nice to see snow, albeit in a movie.

I keep thinking of him saying "your toes would curl!"