criterionforum.org

jedgeco wrote: Fri Nov 08, 2019 6:12 pm Anybody call him yet?

Contacting him now. "Hate to do this via text big guy but we need to break up. I can’t date a man who isn’t able to deliver me chicken mcnuggets and non-alcoholic beer and drive me to the proctologist twice a week. Hope you like taking the bus, hot pants"

I thought maybe I’d give him a call to see if he had any Vinessa Shaw nude pics he could send me.

Wells is having an uproar over the possibility of a Bernie Sanders nomination, beating out his boy Pete Buttigieg. This is what happens when you pal around with Sasha Stone for too much of your ime.

Did.. did he just insult her in an otherwise heartfelt memoriam?

The passage after Laggies says it all.

Classy.

It's a real sickness when you're so conditioned to being condescending that you dole out unintentional mean-spiritedness when trying to be heartfelt.

That's called being a real a-hole, I believe.

Wells - not for the first time - has sound issues with his upstairs neighbors. He has written a typically Wells letter in response: weirdly aggressive, snidely rude and totally lacking in self-awareness.

“In an apartment complex with thin walls, it is not only unneighborly but uncivilized to speak loudly in a phone conversation as you tromp around your apartment in noisy shoes at 6:05 am. You are waking my wife, who is trying to sleep. And this is the second morning in a row that you’ve done this.

“Are you capable of showing just a little bit of courtesy? Is there some kind of basic blockage you’re trying to cope with?

“Before 9 am, please use headphones for phone calls and keep your voice down. Try to speak in a conversational tone, and don’t bellow like you’re speaking to hundreds in a bullfight arena without a microphone. And please don’t walk around your apartment in clompy shoes — try barefoot or socks or sandals.

“I feel as if I’m speaking to someone at a dinner table who (a) was never told to eat her food with modest-sized bites, (b) was never told to not speak with her mouth full and (c) was never told to put a napkin on her lap.

“You know…civilized behavior? Manners? You’ve heard of this stuff, right?

“Yesterday morning my wife complained to EGL Properties about your thoughtless behavior — they responded with understanding and concern. She also called the West Hollywood Sheriff’s department.

“I don’t care care who you’re loudly speaking to at 6:05 in the morning as it’s not my business, but I’m asking you again to please stop this behavior and stop it now.”

I have seen a few questions on this board asking who Wells is and why anyone would care about his thoughts on aspect ratios, film preservation or film in general. While it’s clear he doesn’t have much - if any - expertise in those areas (or even a working knowledge), I have accumulated a list of his bigoted, mean-spirited and often bizarre rantings that make him his industry’s laughing stock.

He has bizarre views on women
- Wells attempted to solicit naked photos of Vinessa Shaw from James Mangold (https://deadline.com/2007/09/creepiest- ... wood-3216/)
- Wells pined for a world in which women behaved more like well-trained dogs (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2009/06/just-hot-enough/)
- Wells suggested that women wouldn't be able to deal with “The Revenant” (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2015/11/ ... our-words/)
- Wells took credit for a part of the box office success of “The Revenant” (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2016/01/ ... seriously/)
- Wells fat-shamed Aliens star Carrie Henn (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2013/05/ ... vaporized/)
- Wells wrote various about Kristen Stewart’s personal life, even boring other writers about her haircut (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2018/05/ ... -the-idea/)
and suggesting that - if he were Stewart - he would try to sleep with women he deemed more attractive (http://gawker.com/brave-male-film-criti ... 1784483193)
- Miles Teller caught Wells gawking at a woman young enough to be his daughter (or granddaughter) and told him to stop (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2014/10/ ... ert-story/)
- Wells wrote a post that was one of the inspirations behind Amy Schumer’s “Last F*ckable Day” skit (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2008/04/slight-disparit/)

He frequently engages in vindictive or weird online relationships with film writers and filmmakers
- Wells told fellow blogger Drew McWeeny he hoped that McWeeny would have a heart attack and leave his children fatherless. (https://twitter.com/DrewMcWeeny/status/ ... 6495255552)
- Wells gave a shockingly insincere commiserations to McWeeny when the later lost his job (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2016/09/ ... s-pothole/ https://twitter.com/DrewMcWeeny/status/ ... 5715435529)
- Wells accused rival Oscar blogger Ryan 'Wee Man' Adams of alcoholism because over Adams’ disdain for Wells' coverage of the 2014/2015 Oscar race (https://www.awardsdaily.com/2015/01/08/ ... istortion/)
- Wells refused to attend a conference with other critics at a British Festival after a mishap with the Wi-Fi at the hotel (https://www.ericdsnider.com/blog/jeff-w ... f-himself/)
- Wells asked a dying Ebert to weigh in on the Shane aspect ratio controversy (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2013/04/ ... -required/)
- Wells still insisted he was correct about “Rosemary’s Baby” aspect ration even when Polanski himself insisted he was wrong (http://www.criterionforum.org/forum/vie ... 1&start=75)
- Wells has a well-known antagonism towards fellow blogger David Poland, making frequent “Jihad” references towards Poland’s ethnicity (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2011/07/what-gives/)
- Mark Romanek attacked Wells when the later tried to passive aggressively minimise Domnhall Gleeson’s success in 2015 (https://twitter.com/wellshwood/status/6 ... 1013913600)
- James Mangold had enough of Wells’ obnoxiousness and attacked him on Twitter (https://www.indiewire.com/2017/12/james ... 201908819/)
- Wells is increasingly banning left-of-centre commentators and his site is home for alt-right loonies and Trump apologists (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2020/06/ ... d-to-curb/)

He has poor filmgoing/film writing etiquette
- Wells frequently walks out of films that he can't cope with, like “Destroyer” (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2018/09/ ... n-my-seat/) and “The Incredibles 2” (https://twitter.com/DrewMcWeeny/status/ ... 6585982978)
- Wells suggested that he is right and others are wrong about Inglourious Basterds because the ‘Movie Godz’ told him so (https://www.awardsdaily.com/2010/02/17/ ... -basterds/)
- Wells pretended to have a heart attack when caught sneaking in a film festival screening (https://twitter.com/Nickrob/status/1040407113451728896)
- Wells arrived late for a media screening and made himself a pain to cinema staff (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2014/05/ ... y-shutout/)

He is a nuisance for PR people
- Wells walked out of interviewing Jason Clarke at a Zero Dark Thirty press event because the meter on his parking spot was running out (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2012/12/jessica-and-jas/)
- Self-described “Mellow” Wells berated “Irked” Kurt Russell at an event for “Hateful Eight” about the gun control debate (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2015/12/ ... trols-etc/)
- during an Armageddon press conference, a pre-H-E Wells annoyed Ben Affleck and the rest of the press with his irrelevant questions about “Dogma”. Affleck's response: "How silly and lame is that ... I mean, to borrow a phrase: 'Who the fuck talks like that?'” (https://www.eonline.com/news/36857/affl ... es-website)
- Wells left a hat at a Bed and Breakfast near the Sundance Film Festival to book a room for next year. He suggested the hat was "emotionally vivid” and eventually the proprietor was so frustrated by his behaviour that she gave the hat to police for Wells to collect (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2012/05/ ... recap-4-1/ http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2008/12/end-of-the-hat/)
- Wells wrote a hilariously delusional email to Robert Redford when Sundance didn’t provide him with press credentials (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2019/01/ ... -card-zip/)

His personal life is often in turmoil due to his “eccentric” personality
- Wells posted a hateful ranting over his gay neighbour (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2013/03/ ... -upstairs/)
- Wells called his scooter a "rumblehog", putting a fox tail on it and spending multiple posts defending that … until the tail was stolen in record time, something everyone called (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2018/07/ ... y-foxtail/)
- Wells almost killed another driver due to negligence behind the wheel and found the driver’s shock hilarious (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2017/07/ ... omans-car/)
- Wells attempted to eat pear cake in tin foil at a plush restaurant and was stunned when the staff refused to give him utensils as they were closing up (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2012/05/ ... recap-5-1/)

He behaves excruciatingly poorly whenever anyone passes away
- Wells bragged about ‘crashing’ James Gandolfini’s funeral: in truth, he mistakenly thought he had when – in fact – it was a public funeral (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2013/06/ ... ervention/)
- Wells’ obituary of Bob Clark represents all his worst instincts, from unasked for opinions about the director’s work to an attempt to blame him for his death: “Clark always struck me as a coarse and unsubtle man because he always made grossly “commercial” movies — i.e., ones that always aimed low, low, lower than low. His films always managed to convey a certain blue-collar crudeness, and I pretty much hated each and every one of them” (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2007/04/bob-clark-is-de/)
- Wells had a pretty disgusting obituary of Lynn Shelton, where he made a point that her best film was written by someone else (https://twitter.com/EscapeIntoFilm/stat ... 3353286656)

And these are just plain weird thoughts
- Wells hates burgundy and maroon (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2019/05/ ... or-maroon/)
- Wells believes the best comedies don’t make you laugh (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2017/06/ ... -comedies/ http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2009/09/no-laugh-funny/)
- Wells feels that long showers are for the weak (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2010/05/ ... he-show-2/)
- Wells asserts he has never been impressed by Jupiter (http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2017/04/who-cares-2/)

What a disgusting man.

Seriously, Jupiter rules, what the dang

That Miles Teller story is hilarious. This section of the story is truly the greatest thing anyone has ever written.

Then I realized the guy, who was wearing a powder-blue shirt of some kind, was Miles Teller….”yo, Whiplash!” I naturally started eyeballing him instead of ginger girl. Then ginger girl dropped something and bent over to pick it up just as she and Teller were passing me, and I couldn’t resist checking out the cheeks. Hey, anybody would have…c’mon. She wasn’t looking so what the hell…right? Except Teller was looking at me. And then the humiliation: “Don’t be a pervert, man.” And he kind of bellowed it. Shamed, I tried a little “oh, no, no, man…I was just…you know, you and Damien Chazelle, man…I’m on the team!” But he kept looking at me like I was scum. The irony is that I never gape at women shamelessly.

I wholeheartedly believe that Jeffery Wells would never gape at women. He would just email them asking for nudes.

How is this guy not a Tim Heidecker character?

Wells lives in a bubble in which the rules of the world are upside down and an obituary is meant to be a list of grievances.

Even by his usual low standards, this obituary of the "gainfully employed" Ennio Morricone is a pathetic takedown piece.

http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2020/07/muted-respect/

"Ennio Morricone was a talented, gainfully employed composer who knew from catchy hooks and whistling melodies, but to a significant degree he was a a genre guy. Because when you boil it right down his whole career rests upon his scores for Sergio Leone‘s spaghetti westerns (A Fistful of Dollars, For A Few Dollars More, Once Upon A Time in the West) and, more recently, his score for Quentin Tarantino‘s The Hateful Eight. Plus the scores for Gillo Pontecorvo‘s The Battle of Algiers, Bernardo Bertolucci‘s 1900 and Terrence Malick‘s Days of Heaven (along with Leo Kottke). In the Italian realm Morricone’s music wasn’t as deep or ravishing as Nino Rota‘s, and he certainly wasn’t in the same league as Hollywood powerhouse composers like Bernard Herrmann, Max Steiner, Franz Waxman, Elmer Bernstein, John Williams, Jerry Goldsmith, James Horner, David Raksin, Dimitri Tiomkin, Miklos Rozsa, Maurice Jarre, Alex North and Hugo Freidhofer. Not in my book, he wasn’t."

Thank God for Joe Dante.

"Wow. Can you spell T-O-N-E D-E-A-F???

If you don't appreciate Morricone you don't appreciate the emotions that movie music can invoke.
Not in the same league as James Horner, a clever orchestrator whose compositions stole shamelessly from Jerry Goldsmith??
Does Jeff actually LISTEN to music?
Cuz he sure doesn't seem to hear it."

Maurice Micklewhite wrote: Tue Jul 07, 2020 5:16 am his whole career rests upon his scores for Sergio Leone‘s spaghetti westerns (A Fistful of Dollars, For A Few Dollars More, Once Upon A Time in the West) and, more recently, his score for Quentin Tarantino‘s The Hateful Eight. Plus the scores for Gillo Pontecorvo‘s The Battle of Algiers, Bernardo Bertolucci‘s 1900 and Terrence Malick‘s Days of Heaven (along with Leo Kottke).

If it were true that only these movies sum up Morricone's career (which they definitely don't), that would still be an amazing career.

Morricone scored how many Vinessa Shaw movies again? Clearly not a real talent

From the reply chain to Joe Dante’s comment:

Mark G: Right on, Joe. This site is becoming a sad parody of itself.

Jeff: HE to Mark G: Eat my ass.

okcmaxk wrote: Tue Jul 07, 2020 5:37 pm From the reply chain to Joe Dante’s comment:

Mark G: Right on, Joe. This site is becoming a sad parody of itself.

Jeff: HE to Mark G: Eat my ass.

Obviously not from the real Jeffrey Wells, as he didn’t mention how a kinky lil number with thigh high boots and flower child wildness used to eat his ass on the reg back in the spring of 1973

Jeff Wells, certified critic of composing and music in film.

His usual thin-skinned defensiveness aside, though ... he’s sorta right, in that the freak out over his Morricone obit is a tad much. So he’s not a huge Morricone fan - it’s not like anyone gave a fig what Jeff Wells’ opinion of Morricone was three days ago, why start now.

I don’t know why the freakouts are aimed at his opinion when the real issue is to make an obit and then roast the dead to elevate the self, which he just did to Shelton and probably has for a while. That’s what I care about, his disrespectful attitude to the man not his opinion on the art. It’s a natural consequence to get flack from people on social media when you send a provocation out into the internet stratosphere, by making a socially inappropriate statement condescending a beloved artist on the day he dies.

All of this just seems like a pertinent reminder of why Twitter is terrible and should be jettisoned into space. The kind of dumb bad take someone might make to a friend at the pub gets broadcast to thousands, necessitating comment and handwringing discussion of said bad take, and nobody gains anything positive from the experience.