THE FRONT RUNNER

[jo]

Sen Hart recalls their friendship --

www.denverpost.com/2018/08/27/gary-hart-john-mccain-colorado/

What a unique coincidence that the good Senator from Colorado is being thrust into the limelight via 2 very different focuses:

-- the McCain funeral in Washington and the Telluride (Colorado) premiere of The Front Runner.

Hope the press keeps a respectful distance in Washington.


*****************************************



In a similar account of his friendship with John McCain ( Gary Hart was Best Man for John's wedding), there's a photo of how the good Senator now looks --

www.cpr.org/news/story/gary-hart-remembers-john-mccain-let-us-now-praise-a-famous-man

[jo]

[jo]

The ladies all want a photo op

http://instagram.com/p/BnNeco-FoAO

Where are the Wolverine fanboys

[jo]

Rebecca Keegan
@thatrebecca
57m


Replying to
@rilaws
But sometimes the names help?... Like, it's the only way I know if I'm talking to Richard Lawson or Hugh Jackman.

***********************************


Richard Lawson
@rilaws
42m

You are always speaking to Hugh Jackman

Both Richard and Rebecca write for VANITY FAIR

[jo]

More Telluride atmosphere.

[jo]

[njr]

Sept 1, 2018 22:05:19 GMT -5 jo said:

GoldDerby finally discovers THE FRONT RUNNER!

www.goldderby.com/article/2018/telluride-film-festival-first-man-oscars-news-1483952073/

What do celebrated astronaut Neil Armstrong and disgraced former presidential candidate Gary Hart have in common? A lot, actually, at least as portrayed by Ryan Gosling and Hugh Jackman, respectively, in “First Man” and “The Front Runner.” These films from directors Damien Chazelle and Jason Reitman hardly look like two sides of the same coin on the surface, but they made for a hell of a double feature for those of us at the Telluride Film Festival who chose to spend the opening night Friday camped out at the Werner Herzog Cinema.

Basically, both the rocket man and the politician are emotionally constipated guys who resent the part of being a public figure that demands you parade your private life in front of the press. But Armstrong and Hart also have a hard time just even having a private life, too, at least when it comes to interacting with their long-suffering wives: their public reticence mirrors a private coolness, too, that’s hard to fathom. Other than that, the two of them don’t exactly follow similar trajectories: Gosling is quiet and terse on the way to blasting off to the moon and Jackman has plenty of explosive outbursts as he spirals ever downward amid a sex scandal. One goes from zero to hero, and the other … well, you know.


I feel like I made the right choice in choosing to see these two Friday at Telluride. “First Man” was a hot-as-rockets pick getting its North American premiere here after bowing in Venice just two days earlier. “The Front Runner,” meanwhile, had its world premiere as a Telluride late show after, well, flying more or less under the radar up till now. There may be things to love or not love about either movie, but there’s no doubting you’re in the hands of a bravura filmmaker in both instances. And watching Gosling and Jackman so expertly at work raises the eternal question: Is it harder to win an Oscar, or a nomination, when you’re playing somebody who spends basically an entire movie out of touch with himself? If you really love acting, watching somebody who hasn’t learned to love himself may be the greatest movie love of all...

In introducing “The Front Runner,” Jackman said, “It is a dream for me to be here. It’s my first time here at the festival. When I said to Jason [who previously premiered “Juno,” “Up in the Air” and “Labor Day” here], ‘Give me one sentence: What makes Telluride different from anywhere else?,’ he said, ‘People here love movies. That’s it. That’s all I have to say.'”

And we love them as fast as we can. It will all be over in a flash, so the press and everyone else have to make decisions wisely. The brevity of the three-and-a-half-day festival is unparalleled at any comparable gathering of the film intelligentsia. There was a great joke made right before “First Man” became the first film to officially show in the Herzog Cinema Friday night: “Welcome to the closing weekend of the 45th annual Telluride Film Festival!” quipped the venue’s emcee.

Hope the "Oscarlogorists" ( GoldDerby invented the word ) will now duly take note -- that there is an excellent resonant ( to current times) movie and excellent performances therein! Jeffrey Wells, included!


Jo

You sure that was the spelling? Oscarologists makes more sense.
en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/Oscarologist

Nancy

[njr]

Sept 1, 2018 23:51:46 GMT -5 jo said:

That is actress Melissa McCarthy with Hugh. I love her - so funny!

Nancy

[jo]

Haha, Nancy -- I meant to change the spelling when I realized I misspelled it, but I forgot all about it. Something else distracted me. Try coping with the news updates when reviews come out -- and there were quite a few movies being highlighted at Telluride.

My memory cells have been uncooperative lately

Jo

[jo]

People.com features the trailer of THE FRONT RUNNER -- to give the movie a publicity push!

people.com/movies/hugh-jackman-the-front-runner-trailer/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

[jo]

*Grin* The movie is going to be released by SONY/COLUMBIA here in the Philippines, although the release date has not been announced

We are already seeing some publicity material in the major broadsheets here -- probably via Columbia/Sony Ph.

entertainment.inquirer.net/291689/watch-front-runner-trailer-shows-hugh-jackman-midst-political-scandal

What a coincidence -- we are having our midterm elections some 6 months after the USA -- and election fever here starts way early ( as soon as candidacies are officially announced via our own Commission on Elections) so the movie could draw in the crowds.

[jo]

http://instagram.com/p/BnPIIdljxvZ

[jo]

http://instagram.com/p/BnRXXyBg3ya

[jo]

Introducing THE FRONT RUNNER at its world premiere at Telluride --

http://instagram.com/p/BnL2u1MBIIH

[jo]

Quite a number of people were asking what role Bill Burr is playing in the movie --

[jo]

Moving on to The TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL --

[jo]

After the Toronto International Film Festival THE FRONT RUNNER will next be featured as a HEADLINE GALA ( called specifically as the Mayfair Hotel Gala) as part of the BFI ( British Film Institute) Festival.

whatson.bfi.org.uk/lff/Online/default.asp?BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::permalink=frontrunner&BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::context_id=

Programme notes for THE FRONT RUNNER --

Headline Galas : The Front Runner

The May Fair Hotel Gala

The Front Runner

Hugh Jackman leads this pulsing political drama from director Jason Reitman (Tully, Juno, Up in the Air) detailing a watershed moment for the American press in its coverage of political life.


Sunday 14 October 2018 19:15
LFF Cineworld Leicester Square
On sale
13-09-2018 10:00 am


Sunday 14 October 2018 21:00
Embankment Garden Cinema
On sale
13-09-2018 10:00 am


Monday 15 October 2018 11:45
Embankment Garden Cinema
On sale
13-09-2018 10:00 am

Dir Jason Reitman
Prod Jason Reitman, Helen Estabrook, Aaron L Gilbert
Scr Matt Bai, Jay Carson, Jason Reitman
With Hugh Jackman, Vera Farmiga, J.K. Simmons
USA
2018
105min
UK Distribution Sony Pictures Releasing


Democratic candidate Gary Hart (a prodigiously good Jackman) was the man to beat in the 1988 American Presidential campaign. Handsome, whip-smart, principled and with really great hair, he led George W Bush in the polls by double digits. America loved him, yet that all that changed in a week. Breaking unwritten rules on the personal discretions allowed politicians, the Miami Herald staked out Hart’s Washington apartment to expose his long-rumoured extramarital affairs, this one with beautiful blond Donna Rice. Following suit, other media camped outside his house, pursuing the candidate’s wife and daughter (Vera Farmiga and Kaitlyn Dever). Based on Matt Bai’s exposé All the Truth is Out: The Week Politics Went Tabloid, Reitman’s film centres on this extraordinary week. But this satisfyingly multi-layered script also probes Hart’s own attitudes – the sense of male entitlement that made him blithely unable to recognise how his behaviour would hurt the women involved. With J.K. Simmons shining as Hart’s campaign manager in an excellent ensemble (standouts also include Farmiga, Dever and Molly Ephraim, as one of the few women on Hart’s campaign team), this is a cracking, top-class political drama.


Tricia Tuttle
Additional information
All screenings have an audio-description soundtrack for customers who are blind or partially-sighted. Headphones are available on request at the venue.

© 2018 British Film Institute. All right reserved. Registered charity 287780.
Terms of use | BFI Southbank purchases | Online community guidelines | Privacy policy

The London Film Festival lineup --

www.phillytrib.com/entertainment/london-film-festival-unveils-lineup-in-films-by-women/article_5e89f0a8-6ed1-5401-a142-cbfca7885e76.html

[jo]

The Miami Herald ( which was deeply involved in unfolding the real facts or the fake news about Gary Hart's possible misconduct) comments on the movie "THE FRONT RUNNER" --

www.miamiherald.com/entertainment/movies-news-reviews/article217704350.html

Film on Gary Hart scandal— and the Miami reporters who caused it — premieres
By Rene Rodriguez
[e-mail]


September 01, 2018 01:55 PM
Updated September 02, 2018 02:04 PM


An extramarital affair between consenting adults might seem downright quaint in the era of Stormy Daniels, “locker room talk” and the accusations brought forth in the #MeToo moment.


But “The Front Runner,” the new movie starring Hugh Jackman that premiered at the Telluride Film Festival on Friday night, wants to take audiences back to a time — specifically the spring of 1987 — when simple adultery was still enough to bring down a presidential candidate.


Hugh Jackman stars as former U.S. Senator Gary Hart, who seemed destined to clinch the Democratic presidential nomination after declaring his candidacy in April 1987. But a report published in the Miami Herald less than a month later claimed Hart had spent the night with an unidentified woman in his Capitol Hill townhouse.

The ensuing firestorm resulted in the end of Hart’s presidential campaign — and spurred a national debate about whether the sex lives of public figures were fair game for the press.


The movie, directed by Jason Reitman (“Up In the Air,” “Thank You For Smoking”), is based on Matt Bai’s 2014 book “All the Truth Is Out: The Week Politics Went Tabloid.” The book argued the Miami Herald’s reportage marked the start of a decline in standards in newspaper journalism that quickly spread to magazines and television.


The early reviews of the movie, which hits theaters Nov. 7, are mixed.

In the Hollywood Reporter, Stephen Farber called the film “both provocative and somewhat disappointing.”
“The theme of the film seems to be that Hart opened the floodgates to the tabloid press and became a kind of martyr to the media’s sudden eagerness to flay politicians’ sexual misdeeds,” Farber writes.

Hollywood Elsewhere blogger Jeff Wells called the film “an exacting, brilliantly captured political tragedy” and compared it to Michael Ritchie’s 1972 Oscar-winning comedy “The Candidate,” which starred Robert Redford as a lawyer who runs for senator in California.

For The Wrap, Sasha Stone writes “the film steers clear of giving us an easy moral outcome. It neither shames Hart nor redeems him.”

In his review, Indiewire movie critic David Ehrlich writes “The Front Runner” is driven by two questions: “To what degree was the fallout Hart’s fault, and what role do the media (and the American people) play in the supposed degradation of our national priorities?”

Ehrlich deems the movie “lucid but lifeless” and writes that the film is “broadly sympathetic of Hart’s situation; it doesn’t absolve him of being a [bad] husband, but it side-eyes the press for whipping the story into a national firestorm.”


‘Sleazy’ reporters

Judging by the early reviews, the Miami Herald writers who broke the story don’t fare well in the movie.
Reporter Tom Fiedler went on to become the Herald’s executive editor from 2001-2007 and is now serving his last year as dean at Boston University’s College of Communications before retirement. He is played in the movie by Steve Zissis, best known for the genial HBO comedy “Togetherness.”

Jim Savage, who was the Herald’s investigations editor at the time, is played by Mike Judge, the creator of “Beavis and Butt-Head.” Kevin Pollak plays the Herald’s publisher, an apparently fictional composite named “Bob Martindale” (Dick Capen was the Herald’s publisher from 1982-1991).

“It doesn’t do the fourth estate any favors that the Miami Herald reporters who bust this thing wide open have less in common with Woodward and Bernstein than they do with the Keystone Cops,” Ehrlich writes in his review.
In an email, Hollywood Elsewhere’s Wells said the movie depicts the Herald as “sleazy,” a word that also shows up in the Hollywood Reporter’s review.


“The relationship between the Herald and Gary Hart is depicted as deeply antagonistic, especially on the Herald’s part,” he said. “Gary Hart screwed himself with his own carelessness, but the Miami Herald is depicted as being more or less on the same level as the National Enquirer.”


Fiedler, Savage and reporter Jim McGee (who apparently doesn’t appear in the film) published an exhaustive account on May 10, 1987, about how the Hart story came together.

After the publication of Bai’s book in 2014, Fiedler wrote a piece for Politico, titled “Did the Gary Hart Scandal Really Ruin Politics?” in which he defended the original stories.

Fiedler also told the Herald in 2014 that political reporters had to change their methods after the Democratic and Republican parties changed the rules on nominating candidates in the 1970s.

“Once candidates started being chosen by voters in primaries, the press had to change the way it operated,” Fiedler said. “If the press didn’t ask these kind of questions, who would? The voters needed a way to test the abilities and the character of the candidates.”


“I don’t think the story was about his sex life,” Fiedler said. “It was really a test of Gary Hart’s authenticity. It went to the heart of his credibility: Who was he?”

[jo]

Gary and Lee Hart have seen the movie!

And they love Hugh Jackman's portrayal!


www.goldderby.com/article/2018/telluride-hugh-jackman-gary-hart-the-front-runner-oscar-news/

Telluride update: Hugh Jackman relives Gary Hart scandal in Jason Reitman’s ‘The Front Runner’

Chris Willman
Film
September 4, 2018 12:00PM


Hugh Jackman was last seen on screen in “The Greatest Showman,” but there’s no show business like political business. He moves on from P.T. Barnum to former senator Gary Hart in director Jason Reitman’s “The Front Runner,” which premiered over the weekend at the Telluride Film Festival, and which could give the actor his second Oscar nomination, after he vied for 2013’s “Les Miserables.”


Jackman comes off as such a warm character in real life — as he did in “Showman” — that you might spend half a second wondering: Can he go chilly enough to convincingly play a one-time presidential candidate who didn’t always seem like the model of transparency and mirth? And then you remember: Oh, right, he is the Wolverine — so whether he’s dealing with a sex scandal or retractable knives in his knuckles, he can play a guy with big, haunting secrets to hide.



Says Reitman, “One word you hear a lot about Gary Hart is ‘enigma,’ even from the people who are close to him. Here was this brilliant guy who was also clearly flawed and made human mistakes, but he’s a hard guy to penetrate. And as an actor, Hugh is someone who has so much warmth. His heart beats right out of his chest, and you feel it in his performances, whether he is the Greatest Showman or whether he’s Logan and he’s literally ripping arms off. And I’ve never seen him do anything like this, where he plays a closed box that’s just giving you these tiny windows to find a way in.”


I spoke with Reitman after one of the movie’s screenings in Telluride, a bucolic mountain setting that felt peacefully far away from the current turmoil of Washington, which the filmmaker seemed determined to bring us back to with his new drama, if only by proxy. “The Front Runner” was enjoying its world premiere at the Telluride Film Festival, but Reitman had just come from a very different screening… for no less an audience than Hart and his wife Lee, who have been married since 1958, even despite the revelation of an affair in 1987 that quickly put a kibosh on his lead as the presumptive Democratic candidate for the top office.

The film, based on a book by one of Reitman’s co-scripters, Matt Bai, is, as the director describes it, “a movie with a dozen points of view.” If one of those possible points of view is that the media were derelict in rushing to judgment with the scandal story, another possible takeaway is that Hart really was revealed as being too deceptive to be a credible candidate. (Not that that seems to have stopped anybody since.) So, given that this is hardly an authorized version of Hart’s personal story, what did the man himself think of the movie in this private screening?



Reitman hesitated when I pressed for details. “For so many reasons,” he said after a pause, “I do not want to speak for Gary and Lee Hart. They’re going to speak for themselves. But I can say that their response to the movie was positive, despite it being a film about the most difficult week of their lives.” Although Reitman won’t characterize how the couple reacted to the themes implicit in the portrayal of their lives, he said, “It’s funny, because their initial responses were all about filmmaking; they like how it was written. They love Hugh’s performance. Gary at one point said, ‘Do I really talk like that?’ and Lee Hart was like ‘Oh, yeah, that’s exactly how you speak, darling.’”



Telluride executive director Julie Huntsinger had touted the film to the press shortly before the premiere as Reitman’s most mature work: “There’s not a bit of snark in it — even though it’s very funny.” Reitman had in mind the knowing tone of one of his favorite movies, Michael Ritchie’s “The Candidate,” which starred Robert Redford as a Democratic front runner with no sense of direction, and was also, like this new movie, very much an ensemble piece full of one-liners from political operatives. When I told Reitman that I knew Ritchie a little bit and felt confident he would be proud of the extent to which this film is an homage, the filmmaker seemed visibly touched.


“When I met Matt and (third co-writer) Jay (Carson), one of the first things we did was watch ‘The Candidate’ together at my house. There was something so observational and perfect about that film in the way that it approached politics, and how the innocuous conversations were given just as much presence as the important conversations, and every character in that movie has a real life and is three-dimensional.”

The element of “The Front Runner” that will alternately either delight or aggravate a lot of viewers is how it gives everyone in the movie a hard time as the same time it deeply emphasizes with them. That lack of a singular message was very much intentional on Reitman’s part. If you want to see it as a broadside against the media who brought down a man who could have enacted great change in America, and that sex scandals shouldn’t matter now any more than they were allowed to in JFK’s and LBJ’s day, that’s certainly one way to read it. If you’re inclined to think that Hart brought it on himself, and that we’re past the point where private conduct doesn’t matter, that’s a legit reading, too.


The reporters at the Miami Herald who staked out Hart’s residence and spotted Donna Rice coming out aren’t portrayed in the noblest light. But, Reitman said, “I have a lot of empathy for journalists. I mean, it’s impossible not to right now; they’re getting the s— beaten out of them every single day. And I have a lot of empathy for the characters at the Washington Post and at the Herald in this movie who are, I think, genuinely trying to do the right thing. But it’s very hard to figure out what the right thing is sometimes.

“Candidates used to be selected in back rooms, and that power was handed over to the people that did not have all the information about 20 different candidates. It’s impossible to do the research, and it was the job of journalists to figure out who the hell these people were, so that the public would know. And (the editor at the Miami Herald) saw that as his mission. Whether or not he took that mission too far, I mean, that’s the real question. But also, that’s a newspaper that struggled with the question of whether they go to press immediately or hold off… They felt that thing that is now ever-present, which is how fast can you get to print? It used to be a question of days and now it’s a question of minutes. You see even in film reviews the way people are writing their film review on their phone as the credits are playing, because you just need to be the first person to hit the button.”


There are a few kings of Telluride — namely, Ken Burns, Werner Herzog and Errol Morris, festival favorites whose films always tend to premiere here first. Reitman seems to have joined their company as fellow royalty. “The Front Runner,” which will also play in Toronto, is Reitman’s fourth film to have its world premiere in Telluride, after the career-making “Juno,” “Up in the Air” and “Labor Day,” the first two of which got him Oscar-nommed.

“What’s cool about coming here is it’s this combination of filmmakers you’ve met but also film lovers you’ve met. As you now, it has more regulars than any other festival you go to. You go to Sundance, it’s so chaotic, and you’re not gonna run into the same group of people you saw every year. Here, it literally is a family reunion.

“I love this festival. Every filmmaker loves this festival. I’m not saying anything new there. But look, you work for however many years making a movie. Everybody who works on the film sacrifices elements of their life. And the first people you show it to matter. There’s something really nice being in a room full of people who actually love movies and they’re not there for the party or to be seen or to take some sort of photo. This is a town that is brimming with people who are like me, so those are the people I want to show my film to first.”

[jo]

At the Toronto International Film Festival --

http://instagram.com/p/BnTv01IFM5J

[jo]

SONY moves opening date of THE FRONT RUNNER to ELECTION DAY ( November 6) itself!

deadline.com/2018/09/election-day-hugh-jackman-gary-hart-movie-the-front-runner-opening-date-1202457848/

EXCLUSIVE: Take about stellar timing. Sony’s Jason Reitman-directed Gary Hart movie The Front Runner is now opening on Tuesday, Nov. 6, becoming the first movie ever to open on Election Day.

The move from the pic’s original release date of Wednesday Nov. 7 is in an effort to capitalize on the energy, momentum and passion surrounding Election Day in the current political climate. Following The Front Runner‘s Election day bow, the movie will expand on Nov. 16 and again on Nov. 21 in time for the Thanksgiving holiday. The Front Runner recently made its world premiere at the Telluride Film Festival where it received rave reviews and awards season buzz. The pic will receive a special presentation play at TIFF on Saturday, Sept. 8.

That was why Hugh Jackman's social media message announcing the trailer was explicit in announcing the opening date as Election Day. Maybe that has been the intention all along?

http://instagram.com/p/BnGz4HZDVn5

[jo]

In another film festival in Canada to be held in VANCOUVER, The Front Runner will be the CLOSING GALA film!

www.vancouverisawesome.com/2018/09/05/viff-gala-film/


The closing gala will be held on OCTOBER 12, 2018!


Will Hugh ( and maybe family) be spending his birthday in Vancouver



Jo

[jo]

Still at Telluride -- Hugh meets the unknown star of the most heralded movie at the festival, Alfonso Cuaron's Spanish-language ROMA!

[ruby]

Sept 5, 2018 19:20:03 GMT -5 jo said:

Still at Telluride -- Hugh meets the unknown star of the most heralded movie at the festival, Alfonso Cuaron's Spanish-language ROMA!

A picture taken when he was still at Telluride but he came back to NY before the Labor Day weekend.

[jo]

I didn't mean to say that he is still at Telluride -- the festival closed on September 3

Maybe bad English from a non-native speaker

I was trying to say that the post is related to the Telluride photo gallery ( since our current topic is another festival, the one in Toronto).


Jo