Today at the New York Film Festival- SAINT LAURENT, THE BLUE ROOM and THE 50 YEAR ARGUMENT

NYFF head Kent Jones introduces The 50 Year Argument

Three films today, two press screenings and a public. The first two films will be getting longer reviews in a day or so.

SAINT LAURENT is an unauthorized biography of Yves Saint Laurent focusing, in the director's words, what it took to be Saint Laurent. Actually the film focuses on the sex and drugs in the designers life from 1966 to 1976.  There are some design moments but mostly its just the sex and drugs (including an ODing dog). I didn't get it, especially at two and a half hours.

THE BLUE ROOM is a killer crime drama with a man arrested for killing his wife and his lover's husband. I'll have a lot to say in a review which will come soon, but the  short version is the film is a super modern noir. A must see. It hots theaters and VOD Friday.

THE 50 YEAR ARGUMENT played on HBO tonight. Had I known that before I bought the ticket I would have waited.

Truthfully Marty Scorsese direction or no, this film is for fans of the New York Review of Books only. A hagiographic circle jerk of self congratulation the film is the editors and the contributors explaining why they are so wonderful. If you don't know the Review or its contributors it means little.

Made up of talking heads largely reading excerpts from the Review this gets old really fast. Yes we learn that the Review is pro social change and truthful reporting but at the same time the arrangement of material is so scatter-shot as to be meaningless. Worse the film is 20 to 30 minutes too long at 100 minutes, though if you could get it to an hour you might have something great.

I can't believe I paid to see this...nay I can't believe I wasted my time.