Alex Cox Blows!

Or more extravagantly, Alex Cox, noted "radical filmmaker" and director of Repo Man, Sid and Nancy, and the forthcoming Searchers 2.0, has inexplicably and, to our minds, unforgivably, blown off this weekend's scheduled salon/screenings at the Austin School of Film and the Alamo Drafthouse Ritz.

Why? We're glad you asked but we're not sure the answer is going to satisfy you, chiefly because we're still scratching out heads over it. The word on Cox's sudden detour into Suck City comes from the Alamo's ever-reliable (and insanely hard-working) Zack Carlson, who rang us this past Wednesday with word that Cox, for whom the Alamo had already secured plane fare from his home in Los Angeles as well as local lodging -- as they do for all incoming cinema legends (yes, even the cast of Troll 2 -- had mysteriously balked at the layover times in his airline itinerary. Carlson emailed back to swap flights around until Cox was satisfied, but that gambit proved fruitless, netting only a final, bewildering email from one of Cox's associates which stated that, and we quote, "Alex feels he has been mistreated and has chosen to cancel his appearance." Like Carlson, we have to agree the proper reaction here is WTF?!

Although we were unaware of it, apparently Cox has a reputation for prima donna shenanigans such as this; however, that was never the case with the three prior events Carlson has done with the director. "They went flawlessly," said a audibly gobsmacked Carlson, who, like Austin School of Film Programming Director Gretchen Upshaw, has been left in the proverbial lurch both financially (advance ticket sales were strong) and emotionally (it sucks to have your filmmaking heroes behave like an Andy Dick).

As of now, this Monday's Cox-free screening of Repo Man (9:55 at the Alamo Ritz) is still a go. We expect a chorus of raspberries and/or prophylactics to greet Zack Carlson's bound-to-be witty, ascerbic, and genuinely pissed-off intro to what should have been one of the Alamo's crowning springtime events. (Possibly, there will be some crimes done, although please, not on Alamo turf, people.)

As for Cox's John Ford-inspired Searchers 2.0, you'll likely see it on video before you see it at the Alamo Drafthouse (or maybe you won't see it at all; it's reportedly in Roger Corman's hands, now). Whatever. Our opinion of the great director, whose Repo Man made it a hell of a lot easier for us to endure a high school era spent in the Straight to Hell climes of Amarillo, Texas, is now greatly diminished.