Screening Season

What I like best about this time of year in Los Angeles is that it is screening time again--that time leading up to Academy Award and Guild nominations for work in film. It's sometimes the only benefit to Guild membership, if you haven't worked enough for health coverage during the year.

Last night we went over to the TV Academy for a WGA screening of I Am Legend starring Will Smith. Based on Richard Matheson's book of the same name, Smith plays a military researcher isolated in New York City after a cancer cure goes terribly wrong. For much of the film, Smith is the only actor on screen. He is utterly compelling. There are some interesting details in the sets which really tickled my fancy. I realized Smith's wall's held some acquisitions from MOMA when I noticed that Rousseau's Sleeping Gypsy was life size and the painting next to it was in the frame I know from that museum. I would no doubt do the same thing under the same circumstances, but my first choice would be Tchelitchew's Hide and Seek.

My sister was an extra in some crowd scenes, but we couldn't pick her out. It looked every bit as cold as she described the experience.

Because it was a WGA screening, there was lots of conversation about the strike in the waiting line. No one indicated they were willing to go back to a bad contract. When we drove over, the radio reported that the producers had made an new offer, but it sounds like they still haven't taken the WGA strike seriously. A flat $250 for downloading an episode of TV forever? Not in this lifetime.