Ben Affleck. Photo by Karina Longworth.

The film related-events surrounding the 2008 Democratic Convention reached their zenith on Wednesday with a pair of sessions devoted to The People Speak, Project Greenlight/Good Will Hunting producer Chris Moore’s theatrical documentary inspired by the writings of Howard Zinn, which has its official premiere next week at the Toronto International Film Festival. The afternoon began with a panel on progressive media, featuring Moore, actor Josh Brolin (who commented extensively on his recent experience playing George W. Bush for filmmaker Oliver Stone), artist Shepherd Fairey (the man responsible for that screenprinted Barack Obama “Hope” poster, as well as a subject of the doc Beautiful Losers) and former Clinton operative Mike Lux. Then, after a brief intermission, Brolin and Moore were joined by a host of boldfaced names, including Ben Affleck, Rosario Dawson, Taye Diggs and Kerry Washington, for a live presentation of the historical readings that make up the bulk of the film. …Read more

At a panel on progressive media (and specifically Chris Moore’s film based on Howard Zinn’s A Peoples History of the United States, Josh Brolin commented on his arrest earlier this summer at a bar near the set of W, in which he plays the title role.

“I was arrested, and it was basically because I was standing up for someone, speaking out on something I thought was wrong. And what happens when you speak out? You go to jail.”

…Read more

• The New York Film Critics Circle chose No Country For Old Men as their film of the year yesterday. The small body of mostly print critics also awarded prizes to Daniel Day-Lewis, Julie Christie, and No End in Sight.
• The Hollywood Reporter has a long think piece on the impact of awards blogging on half-lives of award hopefuls. As usual, the blogosphere proves to be a convenient whipping boy for all manner of industry fluctuations and existential crises. There’s even a frantic quote from an unnamed publicist, who actually wonders, “What does it all mean?” Classic.
• “They lie. And then they lie again. And then they lie some more.” So begins a WGA statement, directed at the AMPTP, released yesterday in the wake of the weekend’s disastrous strike talk flameout, indicating that it’s going to be a cold day in January or February at the earliest before the two camps have cooled down enough to meet again. In related news: there will be no TV press tour this spring, because there will be (almost) no TV this spring.
• Chris Moore from Project Greenlight–you know, that reality show that had something to do with Ben Affleck and Matt Damon?–will produce a feature-length doc based on Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States–you know, that book Matt Damon namedropped in Good Will Hunting?