Blue Chip and Coveted

Fair warning: I'm about to do something that I quasi-swore that I wouldn't do on this blog - slag off another filmmaker.

Thumbsucker, a film that I'd written about previously (and saw and generally liked earlier this year at Sundance) has been getting a lot of interesting, if not entirely flattering, press out of director Mike Mills' recent press junkets. First, a short tale of my seeing Thumbsucker in Park City - the friend who saw it with me asked in advance if I knew who had directed it, and I told her. Not recognizing his name, I said, "he's like the poster boy for RES Magazine". I said this as a joke, although he is the kind of director that RES really luvs. But I was still really surprised when I saw, later that day, a stack of RES Magazines with Thumbsucker and Mike Mills on the cover. Remember, at the time (January), the only people who could see Thumbsucker (which was then without a distributor) were in Park City, yet the editors at RES thought it should be the cover story ("We check in with the acclaimed director and designer on the four-year making of the film. Plus, Mills talks about his most meaningful work."). I rest my case.