Screening Gotham: An Exploitation Kingpin We Love

Captivity producer Courtney Solomon (Photo: NYT)

Some of today's movie news of note from around New York:

--Now this is the kind of guy whose exploitation fantasies I can get behind: It's not that Courtney Solomon is any kind of breaking news or stunning talent, but at least the guy has the balls to acknowledge he is going for full-on, unapologetic genre trash with his studio's torture-porn entry Captivity. He tells The Times's Michael Cieply today that After Dark Films plans a premiere bash complete with Suicide Girls, cage fighting and -- wait for it -- "live torture rooms." Of the party as a whole, Solomon snickers that "the women's groups will love it," though neither his distribution partners at Lionsgate nor his director Roland Joffé had anything to say about it to Cieply. Yes, Solomon is a total retard, but better that than an emotionally crippled scumfuck liar like Eli Roth. Do not expect any Abu Ghraib analogies from a guy who compares himself to Larry Flynt.

--Remember The Reeler's suggested alternatives to AFI's anemic 100 Years, 100 Movies list released last week? Here's a good one: Glenn Kenny's 100 Great American Movies That DIDN'T Make the AFI List. Sure, it's still a godforesaken list, but at least it emphasizes aesthetic accomplishments over some hand-me-down Hollywood mythology. (That said, considering all the recent glowing accolades for Killer of Sheep, where is it on this and other permutations of the "Top 100"?) Later today, expect the NYC-based Alliance of Women Film Journalists to announce its own list, with -- gasp -- women filmmakers on it!

--Three cheers for Filmbrain's Andrew Grant, who starts off this week with suggested classic viewing of his own: Walt Disney's The Story of Menstruation. Courtney Solomon, I smell remake!

Posted at June 25, 2007 9:26 AM