Archive for April, 2016

Cheadle’s Imaginative “Miles” Biopic A Work Of Art

Posted by Duane Dudek
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It’s tough to pull off a musical film biography.

For every “Ray,” in which Jamie Foxx captured something essential about Ray Charles, there is a lurching and episodic “I Saw the Light” in which country music legend Hank Williams is played by English actor Tom Hiddleston, who is six years older than Williams was when he died at 29.

The best musical biopics reveal an artist’s life through his or her artistic impulses, as in the Brian Wilson story “Love and Mercy.”

But musical biopics usually focus on personal tragedies since the artists portrayed often have turbulent lives, and because creativity is an interior process that is hard to dramatize.

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An Absurd And Amusing “Elvis & Nixon”

Posted by Duane Dudek
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A picture is worth a thousand words.

Or however many words it takes to fill the 100 minute running time of “Elvis & Nixon.”

It may be the only movie inspired by a single photograph, that of the titular personalities during what was likely an awkward encounter in 1970.

It occurred four years before President Richard Nixon resigned in disgrace, two years after Elvis Presley’s ‘comeback special’ and seven years before Presley died from an overdose in his Graceland bathroom.

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WTMJ-TV Expected To Name George Mallet Anchor

Posted by Duane Dudek
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LinkedIn photo

The longest job search in Milwaukee media is now its worst kept secret.

After almost a year of deliberation, WTMJ-TV (Channel 4) is expected to name former WTMJ reporter George Mallet as anchor of its 5 and 10 p.m. newscasts later this week.

He will most likely start during the May sweeps period, a year after the retirement of veteran anchor Mike Jacobs last May.

Mallet left WTMJ in 2010 to anchor the news at WPTZ-TV in New York state.

Mallet, a native of Philadelphia, was previously afternoon co-anchor and reporter at WTMJ.

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Talking Smack: Hawke Is Chet Baker In “Born To Be Blue”

Posted by Duane Dudek
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“Who do you like better me or Miles Davis,” trumpeter Chet Baker, played by Ethan Hawke, asks a fan at the start of “Born to Be Blue.”

Baker had a clean, round sound that was part of a West Coast cool jazz scene that harder edged cats like Davis dismissed.

The pair was psychic and musical rivals, with Baker hungry for Miles’ respect.

Another difference was their drug of choice.

For Miles it was coke. “Miles Ahead,” the nervy, jagged biopic starring and directed by Don Cheadle, opening next week, is made in its hopped up image.

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“Everybody Wants Some!!” Has Bittersweet Tang

Posted by Duane Dudek
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Write about what you know, they say.

Writer-director Richard Linklater, 55, knows about growing up in the 1980s and the forces shaping the male psyche, which he recently explored in his epic ode “Boyhood.”

His appealing new film “Everybody Wants Some!!” is also a portrait of boys being boys – living for today and partying like there’s no tomorrow – and has been called a spiritual sequel to “Dazed and Confused.”

But “Everybody Wants Some!!,” named after a Van Halen song, actually picks up where “Boyhood” left off: in college. And the forces shaping its characters are pitchers of Schlitz, sex and playing baseball.

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WRIT, down slightly, leads Milwaukee radio ratings for March

Posted by Duane Dudek
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Below are the Milwaukee A.C. Nielsen radio ratings for March, 2016.

The biggest gainer was fourth ranked adult contemporary station WMYX-FM, up .9 of a point.

The biggest loser was fifth ranked conservative talker WISN-AM, down .7 of a point.

Second ranked country station WMIL-FM was down .1 and and talk-news-sports WTMJ-AM was up .2 of a point.

Sister stations sixth ranked WKLH-FM and seventh ranked WHQG-FM were both up .1 of a point.

The ratings, courtesy of  industry newsletter Tom Taylor Now, represent a percentage of those listening to radio who are listening to a station in an average-quarter hour and measure listening by total audience, 6 years and older.

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In “Marguerite” Talent And Art In Eye Of Beholder

Posted by Duane Dudek
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Everyone is the star of their own movie. “Marguerite,” a 1920s socialite, sang opera in hers.

She imagined herself a mezzo-soprano or perhaps a contralto. Her stage was her estate.

She would perform at charity events in a voice that sent men to the smoking room, caused children to hide under tables and the peacocks that wandered the grounds screeching a mating call in reply.

She was a legend in her own mind but the consensus was that her voice was terrible. And her wealth and position meant that no one had the courage to tell her so. Not even her unfaithful husband.

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Taut “Eye In The Sky” About Morality Of Drone Attacks

Posted by Duane Dudek
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Its hard to believe that a government that practices remote control warfare using drones and smart bombs can’t hack an iPhone.

But ‘Eye In the Sky,” opening Friday, is less about the existence of such technologies than the morality of wielding of them.

It is about specialists deciding what are acceptable limits of collateral damage and how to quantify it and facing a deadline for doing so.

For a single attack on a specific target in an African nation.

“All done from the safety of” their chairs.

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