Thus revealed, the creature buried its nose in the tire-tilled soil...
April 15, 2012
Joe Eszterhas is ridiculous.
Category: Current Events … Linkage

So I raaaarely comment on stuff like this (and I'm totally late on this in terms of blogosphere Hollywood gossip), but after having the tab open for days I've finally finished reading Joe Eszterhas's nine-page letter to Mel Gibson.

IT IS INSANE. And also kinda full of shit. I mean, Mel probably did do a lot of that stuff -- while he denies the truth of "the great majority of the facts as well as the statements and actions attributed to [him]" in his response to Eszterhas, those actions would be in keeping with Mel's personality as demonstrated in the past. But it just seems like bullshit that Eszterhas wrote this as a private communication to Mel with no intention of having it read by outside sources.

Why would Eszterhas write someone a nine-page letter telling him what a terrible person he is? Why include so much descriptive detail? It doesn't serve any purpose for the intended audience (insofar as we believe that Mel alone was the intended audience), since Mel knows what his home looks like and was present during the alleged freakouts. (I guess one could include those details if one believed the person was too out of it to remember the events -- like if an acquaintance tried to run you over with his car during a drunken rage, but when sober needed to be told why you were staying the heck away from him from that point forward -- but Eszterhas never suggests this explicitly or otherwise.) The description of the photograph that supposedly sent Mel into a rage -- "[y]ou looked old, grey, and balding in the photograph, no longer People Magazine's 'Sexiest Man of the Year'" -- stands out as particularly unnecessary. If one absolutely had to describe the event, it would have been sufficient to follow the mention of the photograph, sans description, with Mel's reaction to it.

Granted, I can envision a letter in which one would include these kinds of details despite it being intended for a party that is already largely aware of them, or for whom the inclusion of said details, and the text at large, serve only to offend. It is not the kind of letter one sends to a professional associate -- it is a letter sent to an estranged friend, or a letter sent by a jilted lover. But in most cases, it is a letter sent to no one, written by the author for introspective and therapeutic reasons.

Also, insofar as these events happened exactly as Eszterhas wrote them, then Eszterhas is both irresponsible as a husband and parent and deeply stupid as a human being. He alleges that, the first time he and his wife stayed with Mel, they were so frightened by their host's sudden eruption of anger that they mostly lay awake in bed that night -- with Eszterhas clutching his rosary in one hand and a golf club for protection in the other. I myself have been in a number of unpleasant situations during which I lay awake at night, and on occasion I have been afraid of harm, but I have never been so fearful that I felt compelled to sleep with a weapon at the ready. I can guarantee that, if I ever found myself in such a situation, I would not willingly place myself in it again.

But apparently Eszterhas wasn't that scared -- because the next time Mel invited them to stay with him, he accepted. Moreover, this time he brought his wife (who also must be deeply stupid to go along with this) and son with him, to the home of a man who left him so traumatized he found it necessary to sleep holding a golf club. Eszterhas returned, with his family, to the residence of a man he thought was unhinged enough to burst into the guest room and attack him in the middle of the night. History allegedly repeated itself, and Eszterhas's son slept with a butcher knife under his pillow.

Also, what the fuck is wrong with these people? I can understand being so fearful that one deems it necessary to sleep with a weapon in hand. But, as noted, I cannot understand being scared enough to do that and then returning to the situation -- with one's family, no less. Nor can I understand choosing to stay in such a place when escape is clearly possible. Eszterhas notes that leaving would have been difficult, but it's not as if Mel was holding them prisoner -- nor, apparently, did Eszterhas expect Mel to shoot them if they enraged him. (Because if that were the case, what the hell good would a golf club or butcher knife do?) Before I spent the night trembling with a weapon at my side, I'd take a cab into town or call for a helicopter (insofar as I had the means to do so; I assume Eszterhas does) or even run off into the woods like Mel Gibson's ex, Oksana Grigorieva, apparently did during an abusive episode. But these people stayed put, so clearly the situation wasn't really that bad. I have to assume that Eszterhas, his wife, and his son are just ridiculous overactors.

And I was highly amused by Eszterhas's parenthetical mention that his son "was so frightened that at one point he taped [Mel's] 'outburst' on his iPod." Really? Is that how the kids respond to danger now? I guess it does seem like the younger generation is more prone to whip out a cellphone camera and start filming when heinous shit goes down, but I guess that just goes to show how stupid kids are these days. (And perhaps how Apple is, in part, to blame. Fuck you, Steve Jobs.) If I end up in a situation in which I am very frightened, my thoughts will be focused on getting the hell out of that situation -- not on recording the details of it for posterity.

-posted by Wes | 6:44 pm | Comments (3)
3 Comments »
  • MickMock says:

    I haven't heard anything about this. Can you even record on an iPod?

    • Wes says:

      Apparently? I'd suffer blond Queen Lena's guillotine before I'd buy an iPod, so you know I have no personal experience with the device and its capabilities. XD

      • MickMock says:

        I am stuck on the iPods from like, six years ago because that's when I got mine. I'm sure they've advanced since then, but still. It conjures up confused feelings because mine couldn't do anything like that. =)

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