by Indy Datta

So, when Billy Crystal wasn’t blacking up, he was making mildly tasteless jokes about Kodak’s bankruptcy, thus giving hacks on right wing rags another weak excuse to write about how Hollywood hates America. The rumours of the death of film are, if not exaggerated, a little premature – 7 of this year’s 9 (nine) Best Picture nominees were shot on Kodak film, and next year’s batch could well include the latest from high profile digital refuseniks like PT Anderson, Steven Spielberg, Quentin Tarantino and Terence Malick. But it’s true that nobody’s making film cameras any more, and that almost all exhibition will be digital very soon (More than one studio is withdrawing archive film prints from circulation). David Bordwell, over on his blog, has an interesting series of entries about the massive transition that  the industry is undergoing, and the surprising challenges this generates (all the tagged posts don’t show up on the one page here, by the way, you need to hit “earlier posts” for the whole thing). Some of it, in my opinion, is unduly doomy and apocalyptic (and you’ll forgive me for not really caring if the future cockroach overlords of the Earth can’t figure out how to get the data off a DVD), but it’s an interesting read (and should keep you busy for hours; don’t ever tell me I don’t give you enough links, and that the title of this column is in some way misleading).

If you believe the reviews, we would in any event be doing the future reputation of human civilisation a favour by destroying at source all copies of two of this week’s new releases – Project X and This Means War. Project X, a found-footage (yes, what indeed would be the fucking point of that?) teen-raunch comedy produced under the imprimatur of Todd “The Hangover” Phillips  has been described as ” flamboyantly loathsome on every imaginable level“, “sexist, obnoxious and … mean-spirited“, “a celebration of colossal adolescent idiocy“, and, er… “an astounding, superlative movie about adolescence“.

This Means War is a motion picture directed by McG.

OTHER STUFF:

Kids re-enact the Oscar Best Picture nominees.

An interview with Justin Kurzel, director of the superb Snowtown, retitled The Snowtown Murders for its US release this week, so nobody thinks it’s the sequel to Cool Runnings, or something.

MostlyLinks this week has been bought to you by the number 7.

NEXT WEEK:

Records, Hardy, Nudity, Women.