American Pastoral's Poster & Trailer Are A Beauty

Manuel here. American Pastoral, adapted from the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Philip Roth has a trio of leading performers that I find myself often rooting for—despite early buzzy career moves, each have become underrated and/or undervalued players: Jennifer Connelly, Dakota Fanning, and Ewan McGregor who's doing double duty here. American Pastoral marks his directorial debut.

I initially wanted to share the beautiful new poster for it which is haunting and simple; a perfect example of a one sheet that establishes quickly the mood of the piece. Roth's title and the film's tagline "A radically ordinary story" surely help. This is the American Dream engulfed in flames which means the nuclear family at the core of McGregor's film (Connelly playing his wife, Fanning his daughter) will be anything but ordinary.

And then I found the trailer had dropped and 30 seconds in I was already sold (which would've made a YNMS an exercise in nitpicking because even as it uses the emo song montage trailer template I immediately wanted to catch the film). I also didn't want to spoil it since, for those us of unfamiliar with the Roth novel, that initial sequence in the trailer packs a heavier punch. The trailer looks gorgeous—Norman Rockwell filtered through 1960s hazy and backlit paranoia—no doubt because DP Martin Ruhe (of Control and The American fame) is behind the camera. Also, don't be dissuaded by the creepy "VFX de-aged McGregor" greeting you below.

Though perhaps I'm burying the lede: the main reason to watch this trailer other than to hear yet another haunting version of "Mad World," is to see Fanning in full 60s radical rebel girl mode: 

But what does everyone else think? Will Dakota remind us what made her such a powerful screen presence? 

The Furniture: The Venomous and Fanatical 'Embrace of the Serpent'

"The Furniture" is our weekly series on Production Design. Here's Daniel Walber... 

Embrace of the Serpent, Colombia’s first-ever nominee for Best Foreign Language Film, contains multitudes. Ciro Guerra filters the Amazon Basin into a tremendous cinematic document, a rich cornucopia of unexpected tableaux. The choice to confine this colorful landscape to black and white would be uncanny enough on its own, but the narrative is also unmoored by transitions between the two timelines. Long before the final hallucination, our perceptions are overwhelmed by the range of complex images.

And, of course, the work of production designer Angelica Perea, art director Ramses Benjumea and set decorator Alejandro Franco is an essential component. The best example of their work comes right at the film’s midpoint, with a pair of profoundly unsettling episodes that interrogate the role of Catholic missionaries in Colombia’s colonial history. [More...]

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Emmy FYC: The Actresses of "Penny Dreadful"

Our Emmy FYC series concludes with Nathaniel's final plea for Penny Dreadful...

When Penny Dreadful aired its surprise series, not season, finale a week ago, the event felt as dark to fans as Vanessa Ive's increasingly fatalistic worldview. In its 3 short seasons the series grew quickly from a gimmicky concept -- all your favorite monster myths thrown together! --  with rich visual panache (Season 1) to a complex, increasingly focused, and confidently disturbing drama (Season 2) to a rushed and scattershot but even more thematically daring and superbly acted grande finale (Season 3). By the Season 2 premiere it had become abundantly clear that the blood-pumping heart of this gothic universe, belonged to its haunted, dangerous, three-dimensional women...

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Interview: Rising Star Boyd Holbrook ("Narcos")

Boyd Holbrook © Flaunt magazine, Fe Pinheiro, photographerI regret to inform you that I cannot begin this story with the sizzling lede I'd intended. But the redacted story, of where Boyd Holbrook called me from and the new project he's working on -- were nevertheless a good reminder that he's been an exciting talent to watch. That's not just because he's so engaging onscreen but because he doesn't want to get stuck in a rut; it's hard to guess where his creative muse will take him next.

So let's jump to our real topic. Boyd Holbrook was calling to discuss his role as DEA officer Steve Murphy in the Netflix series Narcos. The debut season was nominated for Best Drama Series at the Golden Globes and before its second season airs, it's undoubtedly hoping for Emmy to follow suit (balloting closes tomorrow). The story revolves around the drug lord Pablo Escobar (Wagner Moura, Globe nominated for Best Actor) and the attempts of DEA agents Steve Murphy (Boyd Holbrook) and Javier Peña (Pedro Pascal) to bring him down. Though it's somewhat of a three-lead series, Holbrook and Peña are both on Emmy's Supporting Actor Drama ballot since Escobar is the subject matter. Holbrook's character is our window to the story and a handy historical reference guide as narrator. The early episodes have to impart a ton of information we couldn't be expected to know about both Colombia and the US in the late 70s and early 80s as well as technological limitations of the time in hunting and surveillance of your prey.

I talked to Boyd about the peculiar demands of the part, half-exposition and half-character work, but we begin with what I suspect is his multi-hyphenate inner artist [Interview after the jump...]

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Water Sports with Dory, Blake, and Dead Daniel

Moviegoers were content to keep swimming with Dory this weekend as the new releases didn't stir audiences. Well that's not wholly true. Moviegoers turned out for other water sports like water skiing on Daniel Radcliffe's corpse in Swiss Army Man (crowded houses but only available in NY & LA) and shark dodging with Blake Lively in The Shallows which had a solid per screen average, a low budget, and surprisingly good reviews. That triple combo could signify big profits for The Shallows ahead if the film finds legs in July, especially if it doesn't lose momentum over the 4th of July holiday week frenzy when The BFG, Tarzan, and The Purge 3 are all newly available to moviegoers. 

The two films that had the toughest time this weekend were the 20 years later (aka way too late) sequel Independence Day Resurgence and the horror/fashion/noir/thriller/satire/whatsit/drama Neon Demon, which risked a nearly wide opening (just under 800 theaters) but couldn't fill theaters -- Elle Fanning isn't bankable yet. Whatever happened to Dakota? *sniffle*

TOP TEN WIDE
1000+ screens. arrows indicate gaining or losing screens
▫️01 Finding Dory $73.2 (cum. $286.5) Review
🔺02 Independence Day: Resurgence $41.6 NEW 
▫️03 Central Intelligence $18.3 (cum. $69.3)
🔺04 The Shallows $16.7 NEW
🔺05 Free State of Jones $7.7 NEW 
🔻06 The Conjuring 2 $7.7 (cum. $86.9) 
🔻07 Now You See Me 2 $5.6 (cum. $52)
🔻08 X-Men Apocalypse $2.4 (cum. $151.1) Review, Podcast
🔻09 TMNT: Out of the Shadows $2.4 (cum. $77.1)
🔻10 Warcraft $2.1 (cum. $43.8) Six Questions

Fan Art by The Glitchway. Click here for more

TOP TEN LIMITED
Less than 1000 screens. Excluding previously wide. 
🔺01 The Neon Demon $606K NEW
🔻02 Love & Friendship $490K (cum. $11.8) Review, Podcast  
🔻03 The Lobster $436K (cum. $7) Reviewish, Podcast 
🔻04 Maggie's Plan $297K (cum. $2.2)  Review
🔺05 Genius $216K (cum. $807K) 
🔺06 Weiner $115K (cum. $1.2)  Review
🔺07 Swiss Army Man $114K NEW Review 
🔺08 Dark Horse $92K (cum. $493K) Review
🔻09 The Man Who Knew Infinity $88K (cum. $3.5)
🔻10 The Hunt for Wilderpeople $85K NEW Review 
 

Happy Pride Weekend, Everyone!
What movies did you catch this week?

Somehow I kicked off the weekend by visiting a facade of the Psycho house (Mommy issues for everyone!) with my bestie and The Flick Filosopher who was visiting from London. But I also caught Genius, The Neon Demon and Swiss Army Man and more on those soon.