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IMAGE COURTESY OF DETAILS

DListed condensed what was a probs a very wordy Details mag November cover article on Ben Affleck, in which he blames Jennifer Lopez, whom he was once engaged to, for his stalled career and crappy box office turnout:

?It was probably bad for my career (dating JLo). What happens is this sort of bleed-over from the tabloids across your movie work. You go to a movie, you only go once. But the tabloids and Internet are everywhere. You can really subsume the public image of somebody. I ended up in an unfortunate crosshair position where I was in a relationship and [the media] mostly lied and inflated a bunch of salacious stuff for the sake of selling magazines. And I paid a certain price for that. Then, in concert with some movies that didn?t work??

Ben is right. He sure did a lot of shitty movies after he broke up with JLo:
“Gigli”
“Paycheck”
“Jersey Girl”
“Surviving Christmas”
“Man About Town”

The last three I barely remembered, the last one I didn’t even see a preview for. And what a PR move to circumvent the actual fact that he was an alcoholic gambler during that time period and chose shitty movies. Normally I don’t stick up for divas, but I feel it’s a crap move to blame his career nosedive on the fact that he dated JLo. Doing a movie with her certainly wasn’t a great idea, but no one put his fingers to the pen to the contract when it came to the movies that followed.

Now that he’s a married dad (to Jennifer Garner and Violet, respectively), his persona has improved, and since his self-image seems to be tied with the movies he produces, one can only hope good things for his directorial debut, “Gone Baby Gone” starring brother Casey Affleck.

Back when Good Will Hunting was blowing up for Matty Damon and the elder Fleck, I was bouncing up a Harvard Square bar with some friends.? There will never be another “Crime Zone” now that it’s been replaced by a trendy Euro-dance club.? Anyway, so we’re at this bar (no, not to go mess with smart kids) and there’s this guy hiding in the corner playing Ms. Pacman all night long.? So, obviously it falls on me to start making fun of the guy.

But you couldn’t here me over the rolling rush of whispering girls about this table of really hot guys.? And pretty soon it’s turning into the sounds of squaking flamingos because Ben Affleck is in the bar with Cole Hauser and some other dudes, including at the time relatively unknown brother Casey… who happened to spend his entire night playing Ms. Pacman.

Say what you want about Ben Affleck, but the guy at the height of his celebrity spent his entire evening signing autographs, taking pictures and smiling.? Believe me when I tell you that The Crime Zone, er, The Crimson as it was actually called, was not a bar you went to to be noticed.? For that alone, I will always defend the guy even when he makes some questionable career choices.

Lately though, he’s been laying low, raising kids with Jennifer Gardner and he’s about to make his directorial debut with Gone, Baby, Gone starring young brother Casey.? It’s based on a superb novel by Dennis Lehane.? It’s been getting great advanced buzz and we couldn’t be happier for the Brothers Affleck.

We’re just keeping our fingers crossed that they get the accents right.? Anyway Collider has five new clips from the movie to stoke the flames of excitement. ? (via)

Gone, Baby, Gone hits a theater near you on Oct. 19 courtesy of Miramax Pictures.