The Jeffrey Wells Thread

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domino harvey
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#276 Post by domino harvey » Tue May 02, 2017 10:15 pm

I have no trouble believing Wells' schtick could be amusing for a couple minutes at a party

Perkins Cobb
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#277 Post by Perkins Cobb » Wed May 03, 2017 1:02 pm

DarkImbecile wrote:True love conquers all
Well, maybe she's plotting to kill him for the refurbished PowerBook and the Mini Cooper.

calculus entrophy
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#278 Post by calculus entrophy » Wed May 03, 2017 1:55 pm

That's a fair deal.

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tenia
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#279 Post by tenia » Wed May 03, 2017 3:31 pm

Don't forget the diamond wedding band.

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Gregory
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#280 Post by Gregory » Wed May 03, 2017 3:41 pm

Well, I for one think this is a great idea and a positive example to all would-be migrants. If people really must immigrate here, they should do it "the right way" legally, just like my ancestors did, by finding a kindly, generous senior citizen film blogger to marry for a green card.

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jedgeco
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#281 Post by jedgeco » Tue May 09, 2017 2:41 pm

whaleallright wrote:This guy (who I only ever learn about through this forum) does remind me of Trump in that there's obviously something desperately wrong with him....
Wells's politics are 100% tribal. He seems to have no a priori commitments to liberalism as a political philosophy or any policy outcomes, he just loathes Republicans because he considers their voters aesthetically unappealing with bad taste in movies. Otherwise, he would have been 100% in for Trump.

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DarkImbecile
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#282 Post by DarkImbecile » Sat Jul 01, 2017 8:24 am

Wells posts a preview of his wedding vows, including lines like these:
I need to write my column every day, but I also pledge to love and honor Tatyana with all my heart.
After watching Oliver Stone’s Vladimir Putin interviews I have even begun to call Tatyana my own personal Putin, but in a good way.
And this part from the extended cut that might not make it in (fingers crossed!):
A woman of dazzling beauty, strong values, great passion and great love — a woman who wears her heart on her sleeve, who knows the truth and speaks it and will give you the shirt off her back. I could mention other attributes but I don’t want to get scampy so let’s leave it there.

calculus entrophy
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#283 Post by calculus entrophy » Sat Jul 01, 2017 12:54 pm

Now I have this stuck in my head.....

Reach out and touch faith
Your own personal Putin
Someone who wears her heart on her sleeve
Someone who knows the truth and speaks it
Your own personal Putin
Someone to give you the shirt off her back
Someone who's has other attributes but I don’t want to get scampy so let’s leave it there.....

Perkins Cobb
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#284 Post by Perkins Cobb » Fri Jul 28, 2017 1:18 pm

Jeffers and the Russian bride get unceremoniously bounced by the Chateau Marmont's concierge. Personally I think this is B- level Wells, but Film Twitter keeps vomiting it up into my feed, so perhaps YMMV.

calculus entrophy
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#285 Post by calculus entrophy » Fri Jul 28, 2017 5:48 pm

Our hero seems not to have gotten the "Riff Raff" memo.

Favorite line:

I don’t want to sound like an entitled asshole, but...
SpoilerShow
I'm Jeffrey Wells

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domino harvey
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#286 Post by domino harvey » Fri Aug 04, 2017 1:48 pm

Wells lambasts SPC for not showing "hot lesbo scene" in Oscar-contender Noviate's trailer

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Rayon Vert
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#287 Post by Rayon Vert » Fri Aug 04, 2017 1:57 pm

I mentioned Bresson because Novitiate contains slight echoes of his passions and obsessions. He wasn’t just a cinematic minimalist but a religious man of a conservative bent.
Very arguable.
Sex never happened in his films
False. See Balthazar and Mouchette.

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matrixschmatrix
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#288 Post by matrixschmatrix » Fri Aug 04, 2017 2:25 pm

I feel like people conflate Bresson's Catholicism with political conservatism in a way that, as far as I can tell, is merited neither by his actual work nor by anything Bresson ever actually said. His particular focus on individuals quietly persevering in dire situations might suggest it, I suppose, but Bresson is a far as one could imagine from a Mel Gibson-esque glory of pain filmmaker- and Diary of a Country Priest and L'Argent both strike me as the kind of movies that the type of Catholics who supported the Spanish fascists would have no particular love for, even if they managed to sit through them.

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knives
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#289 Post by knives » Fri Aug 04, 2017 2:35 pm

I also don't take them to be particularly religious even if they are Catholic (something the man himself joked about). I'd almost want to connect him to Bunuel. Not for style or even necessarily substance, but for how they used ideas and symbols taken from Catholic lore for their own ends occasionally even when the end goal has nothing to do with theology in any way whatsoever.

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Big Ben
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#290 Post by Big Ben » Fri Aug 04, 2017 2:56 pm

If the images of deforestation and the brutal image of a small seal being clubbed to death are any indication in The Devil, Probably Bresson was also certainly aware of mankind's impact on the planet which I usually associate with individuals who aren't you know, conservative. While I'm an American and and could certainly be making a mistake due to political concepts varying across nations and countries I don't really associate that type of awareness with being conservative.

And even if Bresson was conservative he would have been conservative by standards then. Can you imagine what Bresson would have thought of Marine Le Pen?

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swo17
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#291 Post by swo17 » Fri Aug 04, 2017 3:00 pm

Pardon my ignorance, but is Hollywood Elsewhere completely a one-man show, or did another human being actually approve the headline "Lesbo Wood Forever"?

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Big Ben
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#292 Post by Big Ben » Fri Aug 04, 2017 3:06 pm

Also wasn't Bresson an atheist? The Devil, Probably probably certainly didn't inspire much confidence that he was religious, at least in my mind. Not many conservative atheists running about.

I think Wells is simply making hot takes and we've bitten the perpetual worm.

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knives
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#293 Post by knives » Fri Aug 04, 2017 3:15 pm

There are a lot of conservative (or at least right wing) atheists around especially in a place like France.

John Shade
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#294 Post by John Shade » Fri Aug 04, 2017 6:38 pm

I'm not really sure who Jeffrey Wells is and this thread has links which make me assume he's another bombastic critic?

Anyway, I also liked a moment on the Cannes Press Conference feature from L'Argent where Bresson responded to the question (something like) "What is your ideology?" with the reply "What is ideology?" After watching the movie again I could see Bresson as the angry old Jeremiah complaining in church, just as a filmmaker. His ethical concerns and relation to Russian Literature still seems steeped in Christian ways of thinking, whether or not he believed it. Not sure why it's far-fetched to think that a Catholic would believe in conservation. Wasn't Tolkien the same way? There could be even be a luddite element to this sort of conservative--like, the Amish, some of the most environmentally friendly people in this country. I wonder if the way we're describing conservative is also in a kind of American 2017 way.

The Bunuel comparison is interesting. He always seemed to be taking on hypocrites, dogmatism, and the offical-ness of organized religion. His blasphemous moments are deliberate; not sure Bresson would be characterized as such.

What was the Wells comment that initiated this? His twitter feed seems to consist mostly of videos and I'm a reading-only kind of online guy.

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Cremildo
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#295 Post by Cremildo » Fri Aug 04, 2017 6:54 pm

Not sure why it's so mind-boggling that a conservative can be an atheist and/or aware of Man's impact on nature. A bit less stereotyping would be welcome. Also, all this indignation because someone suggested a celebrated filmmaker might be conservative? I thought adult, intelligent cinephiles were actually interested in the worldview of other people.

As a conservative agnostic myself, I'm as interested in and respectful of Scorsese's Catholicism as I am of Godard's left-wing political beliefs.

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Randall Maysin
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#296 Post by Randall Maysin » Fri Aug 04, 2017 6:54 pm

Are the Amish intentionally environmentally friendly though, or is it just a natural unintended byproduct of their lifestyle?

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Big Ben
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#297 Post by Big Ben » Fri Aug 04, 2017 7:15 pm

Cremildo wrote:Not sure why it's so mind-boggling that a conservative can be an atheist and/or aware of Man's impact on nature. A bit less stereotyping would be welcome. Also, all this indignation because someone suggested a celebrated filmmaker might be conservative? I thought adult, intelligent cinephiles were actually interested in the worldview of other people.

As a conservative agnostic myself, I'm as interested in and respectful of Scorsese's Catholicism as I am of Godard's left-wing political beliefs.
My claim was that themes found in Bresson's work were not consistent to what I perceived Conservative politics to be today. Enviromentalism and atheism are not commonplace with American Conservatives. As I stated previously:
Big Ben wrote:And even if Bresson was conservative he would have been conservative by standards then. Can you imagine what Bresson would have thought of Marine Le Pen?
I don't care what Bresson's political beliefs were. He was a great filmmaker and nothing will change that. I feel the same way about Clint Eastwood. Eastwood made his career removing myth from the Western that John Wayne built his career on. And that's a concept I'd like to highlight. Wayne was a conservative (Even being a member of the John Birch Society) as is Eastwood but both men had a vastly different view of how to make films and how they should be conceptualized. Just because they're conservative doesn't mean they don't have vastly different opinions on how the world works in some capacity.
Last edited by Big Ben on Fri Aug 04, 2017 7:16 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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cdnchris
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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#298 Post by cdnchris » Fri Aug 04, 2017 7:16 pm

Cremildo wrote:Not sure why it's so mind-boggling that a conservative can be an atheist and/or aware of Man's impact on nature. A bit less stereotyping would be welcome. Also, all this indignation because someone suggested a celebrated filmmaker might be conservative? I thought adult, intelligent cinephiles were actually interested in the worldview of other people.

As a conservative agnostic myself, I'm as interested in and respectful of Scorsese's Catholicism as I am of Godard's left-wing political beliefs.
I wouldn't take it too personally as it's an American thing. I learned after moving here that "conservative" and "religious" (specifically Christian) have become quite intertwined and it can be hard to separate the two for people, where you say one and the other is automatically implied. Likewise, on the right the words "liberal" and "Godless heathen" seem to be mean the same thing.

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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#299 Post by fiddlesticks » Fri Aug 04, 2017 10:06 pm

Randall Maysin wrote:Are the Amish intentionally environmentally friendly though, or is it just a natural unintended byproduct of their lifestyle?
Amish environmentalism, sadly, is mostly the stuff of myth.

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Re: The Jeffrey Wells Thread

#300 Post by MichaelB » Sat Aug 05, 2017 5:55 am

cdnchris wrote:I wouldn't take it too personally as it's an American thing. I learned after moving here that "conservative" and "religious" (specifically Christian) have become quite intertwined and it can be hard to separate the two for people, where you say one and the other is automatically implied. Likewise, on the right the words "liberal" and "Godless heathen" seem to be mean the same thing.
I also get the sense from American usage that there's not much distinction drawn between "liberal" and "socialist", which is pretty baffling to my European ears - where I come from, liberalism has very little in common with socialism, being both more tolerant socially and a fair bit more right-wing economically.

As for Clint Eastwood, he's always struck me more as a libertarian than a conservative in the traditional sense.

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