Jackie Beat superstar drag icon reviews The Stepford Wives (1975). Cinema Blend Katey's top 10 list. I forgot to link up at the time but I'm always curious what friends will choose. We're about to record a podcast. Wheeee. CineEuropa reviews the Macedonian Oscar entry Mothers.
I read this book. Thought it could be really cinematic. But only if they bucked the trend of super faithful adaptations. Books are not movies!
Release Dates
Just Jared Tom Hardy as The Warrior gets a release date, September 9th. Lady Gaga "Born This Way" on May 23rd. Coming SoonWater For Elephants has a new still (to your left) and opens on April 22nd. PlayBill looks at the upcoming Broadway openings. (Honestly, it seems like half of the shows running closed today, January 2nd, 2011.) IndieWire looks at which 2011 releases will reflect 2010 releases. Some are obvious: 2011's Black Swan is The Wolverine. Some not so much.
Also...
The new site is up (mostly) -- it seems to be flickering in and out but should be running smoothly within the next couple of days. Still working on importing the blog. But you can see the new Oscar predictions and what not. If you're lucky. If not, try again later.
Since we won't have another repetitive day like this until 3010 and since I will be well into my 1000somethings when that day arrives (yes, I plan to live as long as Gandalf... though without the scraggly beard) and possibly too senile to blog, I was going to post this great picture of a certain actress in a t-shirt that read "10" that I screencapped a year ago and I cannot find it. Sadness. You get a link roundup instead.
Film School Rejects funny list of "10" themed movies. Kino London today in film history. 10/10 means both Ed Wood and Orson Welles. TOH I don't wanna say 'told ya so' given what I wrote a few days ago when I changed my Best Picture charts and bitched about people bitching about The Social Network's box office but a 30% drop only in the second weekend... told ya so! Add a few 10s of millions to your final box office projections. New York Daily News the 10 guest stars to watch in this TV season. Gwyneth Paltrow on Glee among them. Show Tracker 10 best moments of the TV year thus far. LA Times 10 best movies of the year that you might have missed. Go Animal Kingdom! New York Press 'Top 10 Latin American Movies of the Aughts' to screen in NYC. I've seen 6 of them (all good) but I've always meant to see La Cineaga so I should go. What do you think shoulda been on this list that's not?
/Film Perfect 10 Tom Hardy should find a big movie quick. The way I see star ascendance trajectories, Bronson was the perfect 'look at me!' move, Inception was the ideal 'gotcha' for the mainstream moviegoers who hadn't been paying attention and the next picture is supposed to be the slam dunk 'I'm a superstar' move. It's no time to vanish from screens! But Mad Max: Fury Road has halted production until maybe 2012? Poor Tommy. Empire David O. Russell's 10th directorial project (if you include the continually troubled Nailed and his short films) will either be Old St. Louis with Vince Vaughn or Drake's Fortune, a video game adaptation. Cinematical Reasons why you should be excited for Saoirse Ronan as Hanna. But wait, this list only goes up to 7, not 10. Call the blog police! *
Paul: You need a fighting name. Like a movie star. Michael: [long pause] Charlton Heston. Paul: Look, love. Nobody's gives a toss about Charlton Heston. The man's a c***. You're more the Charles Bronson type.
Michael: [sounding out the name] Charles Bronson. Paul: Yes, Death Wish. Fits you down to a "t"... Perfect. Charlie F***ing Bronson.
Matt King (Paul) & Tom Hardy (Michael) in Bronson. Screenplay by Nicholas Winding Refn & Brock Norman Brock.
Tom Hardy is such a freak in Bronson, chewing on each word like it's a bloody steak. And we love him for it.
Sometimes when I fall out of the loop as I just did, taking a few days away from normal internettings to finish a freelance gig I have trouble getting back on the horse because I subscribe to a lot of websites and blogs and I almost never have time to read them and if I stop reading for even one day I end up lost inside multiple levels of nightmares while trying to find my footing again because there's an awful a lot of "news" on the internet that feels totally urgent even when it's not and it's less news than rumors and then retractions of rumors to be replaced by other rumors and which, well, we'd really all be better off it it was all opinion pieces
like "which will be a better 2012 film The Avengers or Batman 3?" because at least that's honest rather than the rumor mill which can take HOURS to sift through and only exists to generate page views and, really now, who cares if The Wasp is going to be in the Avengers when The Scarlet Witch (my favorite) isn't and why would anyone care that Joss Whedon is directing it when it's so sorely lacking in awesome girlpower (see the monotonous photo above for too much penis) and that's like his trademark thang and if people step outside their comfort zone it's sometimes really painful and that's what American Idol is always teaching us and don't even get me started on what a horrible lesson that is to drill into people week after week "STAY IN YOUR BOX!!!" because sometimes the world would really benefit from everyone stepping out of their boxes and doing something a little different, you know, instead of just relentlessly copying previous cool things whether it was their cool thing to begin with or not but...
okay okay okay some people like Gwyneth Paltrow probably shoulda stayed in the acting box instead of wasting her youth on GOOP and what is all this sudden buzz about her Oscar chances for a reboot of Crazy Heart because I had no idea she was acting again and everytime someone asks me about her and the Best Original Song category I actually have no earthly idea what they're talking about -- stop e-mailing me but yes, yes, I thought it was interesting what Tom Hardy said -- because I haven't really been reading the internet in three days because I haven't had much time but even when I don't have much time I totally notice things like how cute Nicole Kidman is looking or that Cheyenne Jackson is going to be on Glee even though he's not playing one of the mysteriously absent gay Rachel dads who make NO narrative sense because gay dads would be alloverthatshit if their daughter was that talented ...not that Glee has ever excelled in making narrative sense but my point is this: sometimes you just have to stop trying to catch up and you have to scream "Begone Old Movie News From Tuesday That I Never Read About!" and simply state "I'll just have to start again from Friday July 30th, 2010 at 5:01 PM," you know?
So that's what I'm saying and doing. How are you? *
Tribeca Film I have a new weekly column there "Best in Show" where I'm extolling the virtues of MVPs in new movies. First up: Tom Hardy in Inception. Mr Dan Zak wants Angelina Jolie to adopt him, loves her in Salt. The Observer top 10 movie cameos. Wide range of years here, so, yay. Totally Looks Like Whoa. Keanu Reeves & Tchaikovsky.
In Contention Wait. What's this? Fresh rumor hell that Margaret (2005) starring Anna Paquin might finally see release. I'd rather not hope again given that they're saying 2011. i09 okay I kind of think this Green Lantern movie is going to be terrible. BUT. This is so sweet/adorable: Ryan Reynolds reciting the oath for a kid at Comic Con. Playbill the musical adaptation of Pedro Almodóvar's Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown is getting a starry cast for Broadway: Patti Lupone, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Sherie Rene Scott. Yay and also yikes. How can it live up to the film? A lot will depend on how strong the musical score is. And unfortunately film-to-stage transfers haven't seem to view the song score as that important, trusting on name brands to sell the show (see also: Addams Family, Legally Blonde, etcetera)
Finally, let's wrap up with Caroline O'Connor ("Nini" from Moulin Rouge!, don'cha know) performing Chicago'sVelma Kelly intro"All That Jazz"
Yes! Caroline is bringing her all singing all dancing one-woman'ish show (there are back up dancers) "The Showgirl Within" to London this fall. Wish I could see it. (I expect a full report from at least one of you Brits reading The Film Experience in the dark out there.) I once had hoped to interview all 'Four Whores of the Apocalypse' from Moulin Rouge! (2001) though I never got very far. My favorite film of the Aughts celebrates its 10th anniversary next year, so I'll have to return to it in a big way. It's been a few years since I last watched it now.
Summer isn't generally the season of auteur flicks and INCEPTION is the exception that proves the rule. It stands out. If it's not the best mainstream movie of the summer (Toy Story 3 already won the title), it wins the prize for most ambitious. Christopher Nolan first won critical adulation with Memento (2000) and he's proven remarkably consistent ever since. His bulky busy movies are always about men with personal demons in conflict with other men with personal demons (female characters are mere window dressing) who have to navigate an often mind-bending narrative while wearing what amounts to a pop psychology exoskeleton. (See also: The Prestige, Batman Begins, The Dark Knight and Insomnia.)
Inception is a tough film to describe and occasionally to follow. The multi-layered plot involves a team of dream infiltrators who are hired by corporations to steal ideas, the theory being that once you know something, it can always be found in your mind. The sci-fi premise is complicated as is the business of dream theft. Whole teams with specific roles and skill sets are required. You have to have "The Point Man" (Joseph Gordon Levitt) for logistics, "The Extractor" (Leonardo DiCaprio) to steal the idea, "The Architect"(Ellen Page) to design the dream world in maze like fashion (for reasons best left to discover in the movie), "The Forger" (Tom Hardy) who can shape shift within the dream for strategic purposes and still more players, too. A lot of explanation is required to understand the complex set of rules governing this artificial dream world but thankfully it's fascinating enough to mitigate the annoyance of the near constant intrusion of expository dialogue. One would immediately welcome a sequel that could dispense with all the explanations to get straight to the big visuals and suspense...
We'll surely talk more about the movie as more of you see it over the weekend.
And we'll also have to delve into Oscar dreams and critical nightmares. But see the movie first. In its corner: it's totally worthy of discussion which is why the discussion-killing 'my opinion is awesome and all others are wrong' rhetoric around the web is so extra sad. This type of coverage, which is ironically attempting to raise the film up, is actually doing it a great disservice since Nolan offers plenty to discuss and argue about. * *
"They always said that the living would envy the dead ♫ "
It's sometimes hard to reconcile the ranting, racist, drunk nutso Mel Gibson of the now and the Mel Gibson of the early 80s: beautiful,talented, sane... or at least not visibly otherwise. Perhaps he was always a fundie rageaholic nutjob and his publicists and managers were as skilled as Tom Cruise's once were at reigning the Crazy in?
Today marks the 25th anniversary of a Mel Gibson movie that it's hard to remember Mel Gibson even being in. Which makes it an appropriate choice to write about since we'd sometimes like to forget him.
But that's unkind. It's not really Mel's fault that the lasting impression from Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome belongs to Tina Turner. By 1985 he'd already done all he could with the lead character in George Miller's trilogy. And who can compete with Anna Mae Bullock's pipes? Her vocals open and close the film. Her rendition of "We Don't Need Another Hero" might well be the only artifact from the third film that still inspires nostalgia. It's one of those power ballads that's just too bombastic to have existed anywhere outside of, say, 1982-1986 or the complete works of Meat Loaf.
What's more, Tina Turner had potent if rarely utilized screen presence. She plays Aunty Entity, the queen bitch of "Bartertown" and the film's villain of sorts. Some actors choose scripts based on the number of character lines. Some choose them based on the filmmaking team or script quality. Remember that scene in What's Love Got To Do With It where Oscar-nominated Angela Bassett is in court as Anna Mae Bullock trying to keep her rights to the stage name "Tina Turner"? 'I fought to too hard for this name!' Surely Tina chose her rare films on the basis of character names, too. Aunty Entity, The Acid Queen, The Mayor. She doesn't mess around. Like many great stars she understood personal branding and her movie character names are as badass and strong as she.
She gets all of Beyond Thunderdome's best lines and moments.
Consider her frankness.
Max: I want to get a closer look at him. How do I get in there? Henchman: It's a factory, isn't it? Ask for work. Max: I don't know anything about methane.
Aunty: You can shovel shit, can't you?
Her sense of humor. (This is a hilariously bitchy aside to her saxophonist while she's listening to Mad Max's story.)
"Play something Ton Ton. Something tragic."
And her lack of sentiment.
In one beautifully judged moment, Tina turns her back to the camera as if Aunty is about to launch into a huge monologue about her ascendance. 'This nobody had a chance to become somebody.' And then she spins around, the story finished before it has even begun.
"Enough history. Water?"
Discarding her own triumphant backstory like it bores her? This is some woman.
And like any of the best movie villains (or characters for that matter) she knew how to make an entrance (lowered from the sky to the top of the Thunderdome with lights blazing behind her) and an exit, laughing off her rivalry with Max -- "Ain't we a pair?" -- before leaving him behind in a cloud of dust.
Tina only made four movies and Aunty Entity was her most substantial acting gig. Pity that she hasn't acted in the past seventeen years. Was Tina Turner the best rock star actor that never pursued acting?
P.S. This postpunk postapocalypse series will be rebooted in two years as Mad Max: Fury Road with Tom Hardy in the lead role. It's probably a good fit. Like the early Mel Gibson he's beautiful, talented and ... well he's too new to truly determine sanity levels. But his bizarre star turn in Bronson suggests that he can at least vividly imagine the nutjob within. And you have to be a little crazy to survive an apocalypse, don't you? Though if you're a little too crazy you'll bring on your own personal variety... as the original Mad Max, Mad Mel, can attest. *
We're not quite done with the films of 2009 yet. Soon. Very soon. Even if it doesn't seem like it, I'm working as fast as I can. Two more prizes now. The Body of Work prize is for multiple performances. This doesn't always work like a consolation "sorry, I didn't nominate you and congratulations on your Oscar success this year!" category but this year it works so much like that that I'm wondering if I should do away with the category? Thoughts?
Then there's Breakthrough for people that won deserved big(ger) attention this year. You've already guessed that this is mostly about Michael Fassbender. I can't help myself! Fassbender's "year" refused to be defined by the Gregorian calendar. Hunger's release was painfully stretched out and so was Fish Tank's. The gods of distribution have determined that he's the breakthrough of 2008, 2009 and 2010 depending on your zip code. It's very confusing... and global. And we hope he has many more years, however loosely defined, ahead of him.
The breakthrough category is always a bit blurry. Sometimes people have been around and I haven't noticed them. But since I do a fairly good job of noticing new actors, I don't abuse it as much as mainstream awards shows do. Of the five recipients: Sharlito Copley, Michael Fassbender, Tom Hardy, Catalina Saveedra and Sam Worthington only one is actually a "debut". That'd be Mr. Copley in District 9 but since it never felt anything like a debut, it's most definitely a breakthrough. How did he do that the first time out?
One odd but important note: I'm not even sure I liked Tom Hardy's performance in the experimental biopic Bronson. But I found it so committed to its own eccentricity and to the movie's balls out strangeness that I had to admire it even as I had no idea what it was or if it was too much of what it was. If you've seen it, maybe you'll understand.
Honors in this category come down to one question: "Do I want to see them in another movie?" and then a defining follow up "How quickly do i want to see said movie?" The answers must be "hell yes!" and "NOW".
TECHNICALITY: Before you ask, Carey Mulligan and Gabby Sidibe were ineligible for the FiLM BiTCH Award in the Breakthrough category since they were nominated in one of the big four categories. It's my way of spreading the wealth. *
