Brange gave an exclusive interview to Tom Brokaw for The Today Show to promote By The Sea. I’ve attached the video below. It’s just under 8 minutes and he speaks to both of them individually and also together. There’s a cute moment when Brad’s basically like, yeah, my wife can’t cook, but mostly we’re pretty serious here, discussing Angelina’s double mastectomy and her decision to have her ovaries removed this year. She also reveals that her mother asked her doctor while she was being treated for cancer to promise that Angelina would take the necessary precautions. So…um… probably not the best time for me to perv on the Pitt Porn but, well, this is television, and you’ll note, they gave us the cutaways of them holding hands, Angie reaching out to touch Brad at key moments of the conversation. I feel like if that’s where they’re drawing my eye, I’m not that much of a dick to talk about it, right? Also… Brad Pitt really loves calling her “my wife”. It’s my 14th wedding anniversary today so I might be a lot more vulnerable to this than I normally would be.
Anyway, let’s talk about By The Sea. Because there was an article posted about it over at Deadline on Friday and the tone… I don’t know… is there a tone? By The Sea, starring two of the biggest movie stars in the world, if not THE biggest movie stars in the world, hasn’t been heavily marketed. And this, apparently, was decided by the Jolie herself. She doesn’t want her film sold as a commercial romance. For her it’s a “personal” project, more like an “art house” release. So she wants to set “modest” expectations for it instead of blowing it out like it should be a big deal.
Artists can make demands all they want. Not a lot of artists see their demands honoured, especially over the wishes of the studio. In this case though, Deadline notes that Universal is basically letting her make the calls, because they value so much their partnership with her and want to continue working on her future projects. How many women get the same courtesy in Hollywood?
The issue here, if you can call it that, is that there seems to be some confusion over By The Sea’s release. It’s coming out in only 3 markets, LA, NY, and Toronto. Which is fine… but Deadline keeps coming back to the film’s budget at $30 million which, conventionally, calls for a wider release, and some supposedly thought it was to be a wider release all along until Angelina delivered a niche film and decided she wanted to keep it selective. According to Deadline:
One source close to Jolie said all along she has considered By The Sea “an indie film.” However, most of those don’t cost $27M film and a location shoot in Malta. Compared to most indies, this one seems pricey and self-indulgent.
That right there? That’s what I mean about “tone”. And it reminds me of all that sh-t that came out following the Sony hack when she was labelled a “spoiled brat”. Some of the sources that Deadline spoke to have the same tone. And, you know, I just wonder where that tone is when we consider what Alejandro G Inarritu’s doing with The Revenant which was budgeted at $60 million and then it went to $95 million and it might even hit $135 million and that film is opening in limited release for December 25 to make Oscar deadlines and not going wide until January.
On a possible $100 million budget? How many films with a $100 million+ budget don’t open wide immediately? Will they be calling him “self-indulgent” two weeks before The Revenant opens? Or will they be jerking off about Inarritu’s artistic integrity and commitment to his vision?
Click here to read the Deadline article about Angelina Jolie’s strategy for By The Sea and get back to me about whether or not you think there’s a tone.
