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Last month, a New York Times article focused on the Wall Street worries over Pixar’s Up. The film lacks commercial appeal, apparently, because it features a 78-year-old protagonist. This is no country for old men (on the big screen), claim the experts. “We doubt younger boys will be that excited by the main character,” says one analyst quoted in the piece.

Even if kids were that anti-elderly (and we don’t believe they are), we can point to many other accessible elements of the film, from talking dogs to a young co-protagonist who serves as an identifiable gateway for adolescent viewers, that allow the target demographic to enjoy the animated film in spite of the cantankerous codger at its center.

Chances are, though, the little ones will also enjoy the character of Carl Fredricksen (voiced by Ed Asner), maybe enough for them to seek out their own elderly person to assist (whether or not its for a merit badge). We’re hoping that it additionally leads to a greater cinematic appreciation of old men. But not just because, as Alonso Duralde writes at MSNBC, we have a shortage of realistic films about old folks. Rather, primarily because we think there’s a number of other old man protagonists that young audiences would like. Meet ten of them after the jump.

Isak Borg (Victor Sjostrom) in Wild Strawberries (1957)

The MSNBC article labels this Ingmar Bergman work “perhaps the greatest film ever made about aging,” and we must agree. Between Isak’s dream sequences and flashbacks and his present journey, in which he collects passengers representative of steps in his life, there’s not much missing in terms of ways to portray an old man’s reflection of the good and bad of his existence. But as much as that sounds boring and depressing, it’s actually one of the more upbeat and accessible Bergman films, because as much as it deals with the inevitability of death it also presents old age ultimately as a positive step in life from which we may always look back on cherished moments from the past.

Baron Munchausen (John Neville) in The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1989)

In Terry Gilliam’s take on the historical and legendary figure, the Baron is an old man who entertains a crowd with his famous brand of tall tales. In addition to being a great storyteller, as many old men are stereotyped to be, he’s apparently still a great adventurer and hero, if we’re to believe his stories are even somewhat based in truth. Like Fredricksen, the Baron has a young sidekick (Sarah Polley) who functions as an access point for young audiences. Also, it’s certainly no coincidence that the protagonist of Up nearly shares a name with the Baron, whose full moniker is Karl Friedrich Hieronymus, Baron von Munchausen.

Umberto Domenico Ferrari (Carlo Battisti) in Umberto D. (1952)

The access point for this Vittorio De Sica classic is Umberto’s dog, Flike. While many young viewers will be bored with the first half of the old man’s sad story, and any child will be upset by Umberto’s attempts to abandon and even kill Flike, many scenes between the character and his best friend, particularly the finale, are akin to something found in a kids movie about a boy and his dog. It’s just that here there’s a poor elderly man instead of a boy.

Dante Remus Lazarescu (Ioan Fiscuteanu) in The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (2005)

In some ways this Romanian film is even slower and sadder than Umberto D. And the ways in which its funnier aren’t likely to be noticed by very young viewers. But there’s definitely a charm to the dying old man that could resonate with older kids, at least enough to make them want to revisit the film when they’re older and will understand it better. Maybe we’re odd for enjoying absurd stories when we were young, but we would have loved Lazarescu if we’d seen it as a kid.

Alvin Straight (Richard Farnsworth) in The Straight Story (1999)

This is a film that young people must see, the earlier the better. Not much happens in it, just an old man driving a lawnmower cross country, but Alvin does impart a lot of wisdom that’s necessary for kids to hear (plus, a lot of it is old hat to most of us older viewers), particularly the stuff about getting along with your siblings. It’s pretty slow and has no gateway character for young viewers, but it is Rated G and has a wholesome pro-family message. Yeah, it’s not very similar to most David Lynch films.

Harry Coombes (Art Carney) in Harry and Tonto (1974)

Another old man on a cross-country trip, Harry has a friend along for the ride, his cat Tonto, which may appeal to kids in the same way Flike makes Umberto D. accessible. And if that doesn’t do it, there’s also a young hitchhiker to function as a gateway to this spirited old man. Like Up’s Carl Fredricksen, Harry is forced out of his longtime neighborhood by developers and heads out on a journey, although Harry’s is a little less focused and a whole lot less exotic.

Art Selwyn, Ben Luckett and Joe Finley (Don Ameche, Wilford Brimley and Hume Cronyn) in Cocoon (1985) and Cocoon: The Return (1988)

The great thing about Cocoon is that it woos the kids with sci-fi and turns them into fans of elderly actors like Don Ameche and Hume Cronyn, which hopefully then (as it did for us) becomes a gateway for classic films like Heaven Can Wait and Lifeboat. Even for young viewers, the aliens of the film are hardly as memorable as these three characters, whose newfound vigor makes them far more entertaining than most elderly characters. The only problem may be how misleading it can be for kids. While modern drugs can allow elderly folks to have sex and otherwise appear like they’ve been swimming in a pool full of extraterrestrial eggs, no old man is dazzling his grandchildren with breakdancing skills.

John Bernard Books (John Wayne) in The Shootist (1976)

Cocoon director Ron Howard, though in his early 30s here, somewhat serves as the young viewer’s access point for John Wayne’s last film (he is playing a teen, just as he was simultaneously on Happy Days). The western icon plays a dying cowboy about to take part in a final gunfight, giving him a double-edged showdown with death. As usual, though, Wayne is a likable antihero, far cooler than most old men. And like Cocoon, this could open the kids up to other great films of the past (whether starring Wayne, costar James Stewart, or both).

I’ve always been a fan of the kind of reflexivity employed in Hollywood-set films and TV series where we get a glimpse of a title, a poster or even a trailer for a fake movie existing only in the world of the characters on the screen. Often these mock productions are spoofs or otherwise parodic in some way, and they provide great humor to the entertainment we’re watching. I’m not always a fan of these gags being used for viral marketing purposes, however, especially if the clips we see on the web are the same we end up seeing in the movie. It kind of ruins them for when they’re put into the context of the whole story. The whole practice also seems to be overdone nowadays. Between last year’s overload of mock films in Tropic Thunder and the failed attempt at using such marketing for How to Lose Friends and Alienate People, I think Hollywood should take a break from the self-parody for awhile.

Judd Apatow, who often uses viral marketing for his films, dropped his latest fake production on us this week, though it’s not for a fake film; it’s a double-edged look at the fake NBC series Yo Teach! And besides coming along after the concept has been done to death, it also seems to miss the point. While seemingly trying to come off as a parody of sitcoms, it actually looks like something a lot of people want to watch. As a Head of the Class fan growing up, I’m one of these people. As lame as the show is in concept, it’s pretty decent in execution. And it makes us kinda wish Jason Schwartzman — and Apatow — were back doing TV work rather than the depressing comedy that Funny People, for which this fake TV show was invented, threatens to be. These viral videos are basically a bullseye, just on the wrong target.

A great many other film bloggers would also like Yo Teach! to really exist. See the responses after the jump:

• Kyle Buchanan at Movieline compares the fake show to a real new show:
  

  Everyone’s buzzing about Yo Teach, the fake NBC sitcom that’s tangentially related to Judd Apatow’s Funny People, but we’d kind of rather watch that than 100 Questions.

• Margaret Lyons at Entertainment Weekly’s PopWatch also thinks it “seems better than some actual shows” and provides an interesting description for Funny People:
  

  It’s basically a comedy matryoshka doll that also is about cancer.

  Anyhow, I would super watch a show with Bo Burnham and Jason Schwartzman, even if it were this crappy.

• Mike Sampson at JoBlo found the video to be funny, though maybe not for its intended attempt at parody:
  

  I have an inherent fondness for cheesy sitcoms. You know the kind they don’t really make anymore with over-the-top laugh tracks, multiple cameras and cheesy premises (like a foreign raised man moving to Chicago to live with his long-lost American cousin). So naturally this video cracked me up.

• Devin Faraci at CHUD.com didn’t crack up, but his perspective is still pretty much the same:
  

  This video, which is viral marketing for Funny People, is almost so real that it’s not even humorous. Which is just amazing. I would be shocked if Yo, Teach! doesn’t end up as a midseason replacement.

• Erik Davis at CInematical would actually tune in if it did show up on TV next January:
  

  So far two clips from Yo Teach have arrived online, with one being a behind-the-scenes look and the other a straight-up scene that features YouTube comedian/songwriter Bo Burnham, who Apatow is a fan of.

  And you know what? I think I’d actually watch this show if it was real. It’s lame, sure, but I dig it for some reason. What say you?

• Lane Brown at Vulture thinks the fake show looks “slightly worse” than real NBC shows and points to a pre-order page for the show’s DVD release:
  

  …doesn’t this seem like the kind of thing that could be a monster hit on, say, CBS? By the way, the reason we knew it wasn’t actually a real NBC show is because the site implies Teach! has been picked up for a second season.

• Alex Billington at First Showing is not a Yo Teach! fan either, but he doesn’t think we’re supposed to be:
  

  …it’s pretty awful (at least I wouldn’t watch it)…Don’t forget, that this show isn’t really supposed to be funny, but it’s a way of setting up the character Schwartzman plays in Funny People. I really hope either Seth Rogen or Jonah Hill or Adam Sandler slap him around (in the movie, not in real life), because after watching this, that would be great to see.

Check out the viral videos below. The first is a behind the scenes type clip. The second is a scene from the fake show.

When the trailer for David Lynch’s new web series Interview Project premiered in early May, I was so skeptical that I mocked the repetitive banality of Lynch’s “drinking game-inspiring intro.” I’ve since had a chance to see five episodes of the series — which premieres publicly on June 1 and through which Lynch and Co. will unveil one short video each day for the rest of the year — and now I think I’ve found the method motivating the mundanity.

We’re to take that introduction as its producer’s statement of its thesis, but it also reveals something about its form. Addressing the camera in his rumpled shirt and jacket, firing off a deliberately prosaic monologue in sing-song, with the words “people”, “interview” and “different” pushed so many times as to completely lose meaning, Lynch appears to be using that banality as a smokescreen. And why not? This is, essentially, what he’s done for most of his working life.

In that intro, Lynch reduces the Project to its essence: “People have been found, and interviewed.” The word “found” implies that these people were lost, which theoretically could be taken to mean that Lynch’s “team”, as he calls them (led by his son Austin Lynch and Jason S., the producer of a 2007 documentary about the making of Inland Empire) have landed an exclusive with Amelia Earhart. In practice, Interview Subject’s projects are a different kind of lost. Residents of rural America living what appear to be at best lower-middle-class lives, resigned to their lack of control over the random acts of violence (at the hands of strangers, or abusive men) that seem to shape their destiny, all are lost to the dominant media picture of contemporary Americana. That’s obviously part of the point: “What I hope people will get out of Interview Project is the chance to meet these people.” Drawing a distinction between “people” as in viewers and “people” as in subjects, Lynch even seems to give the latter use of the word a slightly more emphatic inflection — “PEE-pole!” — as if he’s talking about alien species.

Most of the PEE-pole also seem to live lives marked by loss. Lynch couldn’t have asked for a better Lynchian character than Anthony, who evenly relates a history of hardship (shotgun married too young, a son lost to random gun shots), and offers first provincial mysticism (“Can I just put it point blank to you? That old devil’s runnin’ round here real good.”) and then oddball, oblique slang (“I don’t put my flavor in nobody’s Kool-Aid.”) to describe his determination to keep to himself. Another sample episode features Lynn, a weather-beaten blonde who calls to mind a real-world equivalent of Wild at Heart’s Lula all grown-up. In a nod to another Lynch film, we fade out on Lynn riding a lawnmower.

The common thread amongst most of the people interviewed seems to be an inability to hopefully picture the future. Of the five episodes I sampled, Lynn’s offered the most affecting example of this. After relating her various struggles mostly matter-of-factly, she closes with a loaded platitude. “I just want everything to be alright,” she says, her voice cracking. She then makes a self-deprecating face of embarassment, and rubs her eyes –– wearily, tearily. There could not be a more mundane desire than wanting “everything to be alright”, and yet it defies cynicism, especially coming from a woman for whom “alright” is something mystical and unknown, with no lived meaning. In this context, “alright” is as oblique a concept as anything in Inland Empire. (Similarly, in another episode, 17 year-old Jenny tells stories of getting out from under the tyranny of a bad man, and repeatedly says that now it’s all over, she just wants to “relax”.)

The project of Interview Project seems to be to locate Lynch’s patented aesthetic and concerns in a real version of Americana, one where the kitsch hides a very real despair   Even if some of Lynch’s portraits veer towards caricature, this is probably for the best — in the realm of web video, caricature sells better than anything else. The segments in which over-the-top weirdos unwittingly offer themselves up for the derisive consumption of the giggling masses (see: Clinton) serve the same function as Mullholland Drive’s lesbian antics — they’ll attract an audience with pat shock, who will hopefully stay put for the genuine subversion Lynch wrenches out of less obvious targets.