Bret Easton Ellis

Started by children with angels, June 17, 2003, 08:59:29 AM

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Robyn


Reel

I just felt like doing this, it's fun to bond over hate for Ellis! ( his twitter persona at least )

People way cooler than Bret Easton Ellis he has gone after on twitter:

Stanley Kubrick ( Deceased )
David Foster Wallace ( Deceased )
Lars Von Trier ( "The one great director who's never made a great film" MELANCHOLIA STUPID! )
Michael Haneke ( ditto the exact same thing he said about Trier FUNNY GAMES/THE PIANO TEACHER STUPID! )
Paul Thomas Anderson


Those are just off the top of my head, and they are all filmmakers, a craft that Ellis is trying desperately to succeed in. Well, sort of. With the exception being Wallace, which is just messed up for so many reasons.

Please add your lists of people Ellis has flamed who are way cooler than him.

©brad

He's in full-on troll mode now. The other day he made a tweet admitting that he "kind of agreed" with Paris Hilton's homophobic "every gay dude is a whore and has aids" comments. He's starving for relevance and attention that his output of crap novels and movie adaptations aren't giving him.

What really angered me were his tweets about David Foster Wallace, who years ago rightfully criticized BEE's work of being vapid and without substance. It's just petty and tactless.


wilder






Reel

Quote from: ElPandaRoyal on February 25, 2014, 10:42:45 AM
Well, I have to say I only listened to one of these BEE podcasts (the one with Matt Berninger) and I have to say I was very very pleasantly surprised with the quality of discussion. No douchebaging at all by Ellis, it was actually a great interview, with a few personal, interesting questions and a very personal introduction to the guest (or, in that case, the band). I actually downloaded the rest to see if they're all worth it. Interestingly enough, they discussed the Jeremy Blake and Theresa Duncan suicides, because Matt knew them as well and it seems they left a big mark on Ellis.

It's my new favorite. Oddly enough, I wasn't familiar with Brett's voice outside of twitter ( hadn't read American Psycho until now ) and got a much different impression of him through how he chose to use his 140 characters than how he comes off as just a guy, speaking on things. He has typed some stuff that truly made my blood boil through that account, but somehow listening to him explain himself on the podcast has made all that vanish. It's an odd kind of backwards relationship to have with a public figure, where you get to know a novelist through his  slew of opinions on the internet, but I kinda like it. I'm enjoying American Psycho more than any novel I have since I can remember. I recommend the Chuck Klosterman one http://podcastone.com/Bret-Easton-Ellis-Podcast

ElPandaRoyal

I now listened to the one with van Sant and loved it as well. Bret may talk a little too much on that one, but this is how interviews should work. He asks interesting, personal and sometimes tough questions without any sense of condescending or exploring but always trying to understand his subjects. I've also started listening to him with Kevin Smith and now it's Smith who talks a lot but Ellis knows exactly where to take him on that discussion.

I'm a big fan of his novels and since I don't use Twitter, I never got caught on his rants that much. Whatever I read from Twitter, it was usually an angry transcription from someone who got really angry at his rants which I, I must confess, found hilarious, mostly because I never took either Twitter or Ellis's public persona very seriously. Now I think he's found a great medium to communicate and I'm all on board. I also think everyone should listen to the introduction of the first part of the Kevin Smith conversation and, if you want, Smith's answer to it. Very good, interesting stuff from people who the general public opinion seems to look down to as of late.
Si

wilder

This week's episode of The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast with Jim Rash opens with a fairly perceptive 15-minute discussion of television vs. film aesthetics and the reasons for the culture's receptiveness to the television form at the moment (Ellis posits that the continual "explanation" and dispensing of "information" inherent to the television series format and its storytelling methods is somehow related to our "information" culture right now). I recommend it, Pubrick included. Start at 1:50 to skip the requisite sponsor plug.

©brad

The podcast has its moments but BEE is so insufferable. Each episode begins with him going on a long (10-20 min) rant while the guest is forced to sit there silently. He's not good at letting his guests talk without interrupting and never shuts the fuck up about himself, as if any of his work in the last 10 years is relevant (it isn't). He is smart and makes some solid arguments here and there but his uppity douchiness can be hard to stomach.

cinemanarchist

Quote from: wilder on April 21, 2014, 10:40:08 PM
This week's episode of The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast with Jim Rash opens with a fairly perceptive 15-minute discussion of television vs. film aesthetics and the reasons for the culture's receptiveness to the television form at the moment (Ellis posits that the continual "explanation" and dispensing of "information" inherent to the television series format and its storytelling methods is somehow related to our "information" culture right now). I recommend it, Pubrick included. Start at 1:50 to skip the requisite sponsor plug.

Perceptive yes, but he's been forcing guests to speak on this topic for weeks now and to little effect. He's definitely brought it up during the BJ Novak and Fred Armisen/Carrie Brownstein episodes, and those are just the only two I remember specifically. I appreciate the podcast being whatever BEE wants to talk about, which very rarely has anything to do with his guests, but I wish his desired topics were a little more varied. That said I listen weekly, perhaps only to hear him beat the same drum about millennials and there inability to go to a theater to see a movie or maybe just to hear him sigh as he pimps cheap razors and used cars. 
My assholeness knows no bounds.

wilder

Legendary comedy duo of Bret Easton Ellis and James Van Der Beek reunite
via The AV Club

Continuing a tradition of laughter that has brought untold merriment to the young and young at heart, the legendary comic duo of Bret Easton Ellis and James Van Der Beek has reunited to produce a "darkly comedic" hour-long series for U.K. television. Called Post Empire, the series will star Van Der Beek as a Bernie Madoff-type American investor struggling to maintain his ill-gotten empire as his misdeeds become public. Roger Avary, the man who made America smile again with Killing Zoe, has also joined the project in an undefined role. The last time the trio worked together was in 2002 on The Rules Of Attraction, where Van Der Beek starred as Sean Bateman, the adorably monstrous younger brother of Patrick Bateman—easily Ellis' most beloved comedic creation.