Thursday, February 28, 2019

Today's Fanboy Delusion

Today I'd rather be...

... downing a stiff one with 
Matthias Schoenaerts and Joel Kinnaman.

A week ago I shared with you two shots of those two (who're joined by co-star Maika Monroe there) on the set of The Sound of Philadelphia, their now-shooting family crime saga -- well there's another! Good to know everybody's getting along. Matty's been real active on his Instagram this week too...

Baby! I know pictures of Hot Guys Holding Babies are a popular swoon-item with a certain set of folks, so there ya go, certain set of folks. Anyway elsewhere Schoenaerts has been making the rounds for his upcoming prison film The Mustang (it's out on March 15th; here is the trailer) -- there's a good chat with him at The Playlist today; here's a choice bit when they asked him if he's making political films:

"As soon as something is emotionally relevant, it is political. Even saying “Hi” to someone is political, I think. You know what I mean? Being nice to someone, being an asshole to someone is political. Everything is political without being explicitly political. So, I think it’s emotional relevance. And then, of course, you have your social conflicts, historical conflicts, cultural conflicts, and whatever, you name it."
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Billy Bond Bound

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Looks like Cary Fukunaga really loved worked with Billy Magnussen (and his adorkable lil' mustache) on his Netflix series Maniac (and why wouldn't he have?) because rumors abound that he wants Billy to play a CIA side-piece to Bond, James Bond himself, in the forthcoming 007 picture that he's directing! What delightful news. (Thx Mac.) Maybe this will be the time that they'll let Daniel Craig go full-gay and not just flirt with it like he did with Javier Bardem in Skyfall. Alright alright I won't get my hopes up on that count, but that's fine because the studio also wants to hire Rami Malek as the movie's villain and that, under this post-Bohemian dark cloud world we're living in, has brought my high hopes down to Earth already. (You got some work ahead of you, Mr. Malek, before this awards-season's slate is wiped clean.)
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This is The End, My Only Friend, The End

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How do we save the world? I mean literally -- the world is actually crumbling. So how does one person, you or I or a substitute teacher in Germany or some choir leader in Iceland, grab ahold of the apocalypse, twist it where it stands, slap it on its bottom, and point it off in the other direction? Do we go epic a la a Michael Bay movie and send rocket-ships loaded with atomic bombs to avert our doom? Or do we plan micro and be affectionate, eat our greens, pay it forward person to person and hope its kindness that spreads like the plague and not, you know, the plague spreading like the plague?

That question is at the heart of Benedikt Erlingsson's one-of-a-kind Woman At War, out in theaters this weekend -- at film's midpoint it's literally posed as the conversation between Halla (a phenomenal Halldóra Geirharðsdóttir) and her twin sister (also played by Geirharðsdóttir). What do you do? Do you go out and commit daring feats of extravagant eco-terrorism derring-do, toppling the system itself and returning us to the earth, the dirt, the endless fields of Icelandic moss from whence our once-cousins rose? Or do you adopt a child from a horrible war-torn place and show her the love she's been denied in this world, one to one?

Woman at War has a lot of fun with the former, giving us a Nordic actioner of hyper-colored goofs, James Bond with tuba instrumentation, while the latter smaller-scale possibility -- a girl so glum-faced she provides her own dour soundtrack -- hangs over the film like a cartoon rain-cloud. It's hard not to side with the showy Crush Capitalism antics, the bouncing and bounding and steel bow-hunt of it all, even though we, and Halla, oughta know better. We are, after all, only human. One human. In a churning fire-storm of sludge. Shoot them arrows off.

And, manifesting a theme, the same specter of globalist doom also pervades every square inch of Sébastien Marnier's film School's Out (which is playing at FSLC's series "Rendez-vous with French Cinema" next week) -- the elite school that Pierre (Laurent Lafitte) has come to substitute teach at hangs under the shadow of a nuclear power plant, whose hum fills the air and the soundtrack; the kids that he teaches, way too smart for their own good, are struck dumb by the future which unfolds like storm clouds on the horizon.

In both films the children are (as a wise woman once said) our future, but seeing as how our future seems like a terrifying question mark at this point in time, it runs with that -- their faces turn toward us blank as a Magritte painting, a rain of poisoned frogs from the heavens, asking what we have done, what will we do, what are we willing to manifest in their defense? Or should they do the fighting for us? A horror yawns open; the animals act strangely -- the dog won't stop barking and feral cats romp in every direction. Bushes seem a mite too green and the sky a wash too yellow -- this is twister weather; static electricity streams from our fingertips.

Woman at War and School's Out both see us wild-eyed, wrangling with environmental cataclysm -- person to person to person, our every step and whisper shot through with helplessness in the face of a monumental horror humming on the horizon, the street corner, in the immediate window frame and climbing inside our heads. A flood is coming, friend-o -- put on your waders, wring out your friend's hands, and batten down for business.
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Garrett Hedlund Forty Times

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It feels like the next couple of years might be kind of important for Garrett Hedlund -- yes he's been important to us ever since he first showed up fifteen years ago in Troy and he's stayed that way this whole time, even when he did things like Tron and Pan. But he's working a lot right now, more than usual, and this shirtless Flaunt magazine photo-shoot that's just arrived is proving he's gonna go that extra mile this time. 

I thought maybe this might be the case when somebody, cough cough, got the paparazzi on set when him and his BFF Charlie Hunnam were romping around half-naked in the surf on the set of Triple Frontier -- that's the sort of thing these guys shied away from before that. Anyway I'm glad we've got a lot of Garrett to look forward to, and y'all have got a lot to look forward to in the immediate sense after the jump where there's not only the shoot but also a video and nearly 30 gifs I made from the video...

Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

Jerry: I never touch a guy unless
I've known him at least fifteen minutes.

Weirdly (for a frothy musical like An American in Paris anyway) there are several choice bits of dialogue that would've made for a good post -- Gene Kelly's character finds time to spout all sorts of wisdom while also wearing the world's most obscene pair of pants. Relatedly for a frothy musical I've also seen An American in Paris way more times than one would think, knowing what one might know about me and frothy musicals.

Blame the pants. Anyway the great Vincente Minnelli,
papa o' Liza, was born 116 years ago this very day.
What's your favorite film of his? 
(Please don't say Gigi.)


The Power of Fassy Compels You

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Until recently I'd thought that Bryan Singer had directed the forthcoming Dark Phoenix movie, and I was gearing myself up for all the fun that those press rounds were gonna represent -- but no Dark Phoenix is the directorial debut of writer and producer Simon Kinberg. (And wow, imagine making your directorial debut with a 265 million dollar budget -- what a world.) But I imagine folks like Nicholas Hoult and Evan Peters, who've worked with Singer a few times, will probably still get asked, so prep your answers, boys! (Speaking of Sir Ian finally got on the record about that.) Anyway we're not here for Bryan Singer we're here for the new trailer for Dark Phoenix, which was not I repeat not directed by Bryan Singer. And it sure is nice to see Michael Fassbender acting!

Or at least standing around with an angry face while the CG things surrounding him are filled in later, anyway. But we should cherish these moments because dude hasn't acted a single minute since this thing was filmed and as far as we can tell might not do it again, either. (Please prove us wrong, Fassy. We'd love to be wrong.) Here's the trailer:
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Dark Phoenix is out on June 7th.
What do we think of the trailer?
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Heathen Paradise

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Well there's the poster! A24 has been teasing us all week with hints and bits of Ari Aster's next film, his follow-up to Hereditary (aka my third favorite movie of 2018) called Midsommar which we told you about last July -- well we told you that it was going to star Florence Pugh and Will Poulter and Jack Reynor and that it was going to be his spin on a pagan cult a la The Wicker Man. It looks very Wicker Man already! I like the brightness, the fecundity of it -- Hereditary was so dark this Easter-y palette was probably a relief for Ari. Midsommar is out on August 9th. I wouldn't be surprised if we got a trailer shortly, too.
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Five Frames From ?

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What movie is this?
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Good Morning, World

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A couple of weeks ago I alerted you to this year's crop of films playing at the Film Society of Lincoln Center's annual "Rendez-vous with French Cinema" series -- well hi ho the series begins today and I've got a few reviews for you from it ahead. But let's begin things off with a couple of shots of the actor Sandor Funtak via his Instagram -- you should probably recognize him from Blue is the Warmest Color or Jacques Audiard's Dheepan or perhaps from playing Nico's son Ari in last year's very excellent bio-pic Nico 1988. Anyway for the "Rendez-vous" series Sandor is starring in The Truk, which screens twice next week -- check out the info here. Stay tuned for my thoughts on that movie and several more in the series!


Wednesday, February 27, 2019

If It Ain't Mads Don't Fix It

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I think I might've blown something in my brain last week with the mad fit of posting I did for our awards stuff -- I'm feeling especially dull this week. More so than usual, even! So calling it a night I'll just leave you with that gif of Mads Mikkelsen (in I think The Salvation?) which I just stared at for... maybe five minutes, I don't know, it could have been half an hour. I got nothing. G'night.
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When There's No More Room in Utopia...

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I guess I'm just gonna be reporting every batch of names added to the Utopia cast as they come in -- on Monday we told you about Cory Michael Smith, but seen here is Desmin Borges, known for playing "Edgar" on the series You're the Worst by people who watch the series You're the Worst (I'm not one of those people), who has also just joined the cast. Borges was also just in Tamara Jenkins' Netflix film Private Life with Kathryn Hahn, and he will also co-star in Paul Rudd's upcoming Netflix series Living With Yourself -- he's switching streamers by working on the Utopia remake with Amazon! I hope Netflix doesn't take it personally! Three more people also joined the cast today, you can see them all at Deadline.


Vincent Cassel Nine Times

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Vincent Cassel is the cover-dude for GQ Mexico for some reason this month -- cuz when I think Mexico, I think... Vincent Cassel? I don't know. Any Mexicans reading this who want to tell me about Vinnie's secret big fan club down there? Anyway he looks sharp and he is wearing some plaid pants so you can hit the jump for the rest...

Finding Madness in the Meaning

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As artists (and yes I'm being pretentious enough to include myself and my online ramblings under that umbrella -- grant me the leeway just this once, please) it's our duty to fold reality like clay in our fists and try to make, well, something out of it. I was going to say we try to make sense out of nonsense but in a post-modern Dada world that's not necessarily exact -- questions don't always beget answers; sometimes it's just nesting dolls of more questions that get unfurled. Anyway we ask, and something takes form. 

In the past couple of years, as we've watched a real madness flood our streets, these questions have seemed even more pressing than normal to me -- what is our role? Can we make sense of anything? Or should we just try to entertain, to give our anguish a Depression-era tap-dance, a rub-n-tug to soothe weary souls? Should I just post pictures of actors flaunting their beefcakes and cram the philosophizing in the closet for now?

Well granting me some guidance Neil Jordan looked at the shitty state of the world and decided it was his job as an artist to give us a camped-up-to-twelve remake of Audition starring a sapphic Isabelle Huppert, and friends, I think he was on to something. And whatever he was on, I would like a hit of it. His new film Greta had me grinning from cheek to cheek - heaven, I was in heaven, and the cares that hung around me through the week... well you know the rest. What a thrill, what a lark, what a thriller.

Isabelle Huppert, light as half a feather, sinister as walking through a puff of cigarette smoke in what you thought was an empty hallway, takes to her tiptoes and embraces her madness, full armed, and wrestles it right off a cliff -- splash, nightswimming in oblivion. She flips tables and comes up with catch-phrases and twitches her thin skin sheathed inside the battle-armor of Chanel, wool surfaces like scrub-brushes, a shock of red rawness underneath. We always knew what lurked there but this, this is something else. Nobody never stood a goddamned chance.

The movie darts back and forth across respectability, goofiness, reality itself -- what is this strange New York City, with white subway trains and suspiciously Toronto-ian street-scapes? It's Movie-World, as pretend as Gene Kelly's dance palaces, an unreal nightmare nook buried in nowheres-ville, population of two and falling fast. Greta isn't meant to be anything but Greta, besides a bit of everything that came before her and might come after, if ever an after, happily. It makes us a strange dark happy place, a bed of nails swathed in cotton and balls of string, a beautiful dead bird laid on your pillow as your pet smiles its proud smile. Look what I made for you, it whispers. It's delicious, I smile back, biting in.
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Five Frames From ?

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What movie is this?
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Good Morning, World

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Former (aww) Luke Cage star (and about to be CBS sexy exorcist) Mike Colter posted this photo on his Twitter saying it's from "10 lbs and 30 years ago" -- I think we can all agree that the 10 years and the 30 lbs he wears now worked out just fine for him, just fine, but we welcome the flashback all the same, Mike.
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Tuesday, February 26, 2019

Quote of the Day

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Don't know how I missed this from a couple of weeks back but apparently Timothée Chalamet was asked in an interview in France at the start of the month about any French directors he'd want to work with and his immediate answer (in French, swoon) was the great François Ozon! Timmy got taste. Which we knew, but it's always nice to see it confirmed. Anyway the really real good part of this is that Ozon replied!!!
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Luca Is Who He Is

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Luca Guadagnino is working on a series for HBO! It's called We Are Who We Are and it's about a 14-year-old New Yorker named Fraser who has to go live with his mother on an Italian military base, where he makes friends and develops crushes and all of those "coming of age" sorts of things. The Observer has a lot more, specifics-wise, but the only part you need to know is that the older solider that Fraser develops "an innocent romantic connection" with is named "Jason." Hey! That's me! I see you, Luca.

Anyway Luca is planning on directing three of its eight hour-long episodes (the first two and the last one, in case you're wondering) while co-writing the whole thing. How he's fitting this in alongside everything else he's got lined up I guess we'll see -- he's got to find some way to kill time until he makes the Call Me By Your Name sequel in 2024.
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Say Yahya Five Times

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Yahya Abdul-Mateen, who played the lantern-eyeballed villain Manta in the Aquaman movie, is "in talks" to star in the Candyman reboot, which Jordan Peele is producing and co-wrote the script for. I assume that means Yahya is going to play the titular hook-handed villain, and everybody else seems to be assuming that, but Variety doesn't actually say that specifically -- it just says he will star in the film. Maybe he's the straight man? Maybe he's the Virginia Madsen? I'm probably just being tedious and they meant what everybody assumes they meant.

Anyway Yahya is also in Peele's forthcoming film Us that I am avoiding everything about to keep myself unspoiled, and he's playing an as-of-yet unnamed character in the Watchmen series too, so I should probably figure out how his name is spoken. Is it just "Ya-yah"? "Ya-ha"? Anybody know? You can see more of him here.
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Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:


Dr. Jacoby: And the fucks are at it again! Fuck you who betray the people you were elected to help! We're sheep to these monsters, and they don't give a shit! We grow our wool, and just when we're getting warm, they come along with their electric clippers and shear our wool off, and we're just naked, screaming little fucks! No wool for us! Freezing and hungry! In the night. In the dark. And they don't give a shit! Then when we get sick, the pharmaceutical companies make billions! They own the fucking hospitals. Filled to the brim. They own the morgues! They own the embalming fluids! They own the mortuaries, the graveyards! These fucks! Is it the government's business who we marry? What the fuck do we care what the government thinks about who we marry? Are we gonna invite them to the wedding? Fuck no! Oh, they wouldn't come anyway. They're-they're too busy fucking! Fucking us at the grocery store! At the bank! At the gas pump! They're feeding our children chemical shit coated in sugar! Why don't these monsters bite into those tasty treats themselves? 'Cause they'll die in the streets! Just like us! And then they'll bloat like a big red fucking balloon. Stop! Stop distracting yourself with all this diverting bullshit, and pay attention. Save the children! Every parent wants to save their child. Buy yourself a shovel, dig yourself out of the shit, and get educated!

Although the delay on shipping it out is sort of extensive -- they're saying 1-2 months! -- Amazon has got David Lynch's latest masterpiece on blu-ray for the cheapest I've ever seen it, an eensy thirty bucks. That comes out to just 2.9 cents per brilliant minute! Boy howdy is that a deal. Time has been super scarce as of late but re-watching this beauty has been nagging at me on about a weekly basis.  Especially after I saw Kyle Maclachlan in the flesh...


Have any of you revisited it since its first run? 
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Queen of the Oscars

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Ahhhh that photo brings me such great joy! Sometimes good things happen at the Oscars -- granted there was a lot of shite to weigh opposite this happy goodness, but let's cherish the happy goodness when we can. On that note click on over to The Film Experience where the whole gang got together to answer some questions about Sunday night's events -- keep your eyes peeled for when I cop to my Yorgos crush, although I think I've done that here before anyway so no big whoop. I mean, come on! Totally handsome.


Which Is Hotter?

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It is the 42nd birthday of Aquaman director James Wan (not pictured) today, and we always wish Wan all the success first and foremost because Patrick Wilson is his good luck charm and we need more working directors who see the value of Patrick Wilson. We know (spoiler alert) that PW will probably be back as a part of Wan's next movie, Aquaman 2: The Return to Orm Marius' Codpiece Kingdom, given his character lives to sexily glower another day...

... but let's look back at the other franchises that Wan juiced 
with multiple Patricks for that added Patty-oomph...

online polls

Five Frames From ?

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What movie is this?
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Good Morning, World

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The Oscar-wannabe Mary Queen of Scots hits blu-ray today and so I figured I'd go looking for some of its queer king Jack Lowden to post -- recall we awarded him with one of our "Great Gratuities" last week for that movie -- but it turns out there ain't much to find. These gifs are from the 2014 WWI miniseries called The Passing Bells but I have to believe there's more than this hint of shoulder out there in the world? Right? He's only been acting since 2010, so we'll give him some time. He's re-teaming with Dunkirk co-star Tom Hardy in Fonzo, the Al Capone flick, and he's doing what sounds like a gothic horror flick called Corvidae with Fiona Shaw and also-crush Edward Holcroft for 2020... let's get them boys in a small sweaty room together and see what happens! You can follow Jack on Instagram here; and see more that we've posted of him here.