Director: Damien Chazzelle
Cast: Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie, Diego Calva, Jean Smart
Have I Seen It Before: Well…
Did I Like It: Let me put it like this. Imagine I am the head of development at Paramount*.
Damien Chazzelle enters.
ME: So, what do you got?
DC: I want to remake Singin’ in the Rain (1952).
ME: Interesting… Interesting. Like, with the songs and the whole thing?
DC: No.
ME: I see…
DC: The film will open with an elephant shitting all over as many characters as possible.
ME: An ele—?
DC: Also, Jean Hagen’s character will die off screen, although its heavily implied that gangsters mutilated her with acid…
ME: All because she couldn’t hack it in the talkies?
DC: Well, see, she gambles too much…
ME: Okay…
DC: Also she throws up in William Randolph Hearst’s face.
ME: In?
DC: Yes, in.
ME: This is because of the elephant?
DC: They’re unrelated. Actually, the Hearst thing has nothing to do with her death, either. I just always wanted to watch someone barf on Hearst. (beat) Although I would imagine if she could have made it in the talkies, the studios would have paid the gangsters off with something other than prop money.
ME: Okay. Interesting.
DC: Also the Gene Kelley character shoots himself in the head at the end of the movie.
ME: Because of the acid?
DC: Unrelated.
ME: The thing with Hearst and the vomit?
DC: Unrelated.
ME: …the elephant?
DC: Listen, I’m going to make your life a lot easier and faster by saying that almost every element of the movie is essentially unrelated to any other element.
ME: Uh-huh. What happens to Donald O’Connor or Debbie Reynolds?
DC: Who?
ME: Never mind. (beat) Who the hell are you going to get to be in this movie?
DC: Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie…
ME: Oh. (thinking) Well, I’d watch that.
(This wasn’t even a negative review, really…)
*Which would still not let me wave my hand and release Batgirl. Somehow, even in my most power-mad fantasies, I’m still stymied.