Music Babble

considering that it's a sell-out film that's literally about the dilemma between cynically selling-out and striving for greatness. Maybe it's all just coincidence, but it's hard not to put an autobiographical reading on it. Anyway, I think it's some of Scorsese's best work with actors - maybe not as iconic as the De Niro stuff, but more well rounded.

I read the Ebert review of Leaving Las Vegas and god I just don't ####ing get it. Shue's "hooker with a heart of gold" character, the generically post-Soviet Latvian pimp, Cage guzzling down vodka a bottle at a time - it's like a ####ing Simpsons bit.

I will say that it has some of my favorite comedic acting from Cage. There's a scene near the beginning where he's at the bank, trying to sign a check but he's intensely convulsing, so he deadpans to the clerk "guess I'm feeling a bit shaky" in a perfectly understated way. It's too bad we lost that guy to video on demand thrillers shot in Romania.