Always Be My Linky
Thursday, July 26, 2012 at 11:59PM AV Club two new roles for Mariah Carey as an American Idol judge and returning in front of Lee Daniels camera (they worked together on Precious, remember?) in The Butler which already has a very starry cast
My New Plaid Pants a remake of With a Friend Like Harry? Like JA I'm shocked this hasn't already happened. Sergi Lopez was so good in that!
Towleroad Lady Gaga's makes her acting debut in Machete Kills
SubAtomicCowboy ...reminds us that that's not technically true.
Hollywood Elsewhere a Marilyn Monroe intervention
Movie|Line has theories on the Robert Pattinson & Kristen Stewart breakup. Interesting though the accompanying opinion/absurdity that 'Kristen Stewart could be the next Jodie Foster' negates my ability to take it seriously.
/Film Battle Royale for the CW as a TV series. From the Dept of Truly Hilariously Terrible Ideas
Hollywood.com Revenge returns on September 30th. Start the countdown
Na na na na na na NA na na na na BAT LINKS ♫
Dancer a Day "You're so Bane. You probably think this song is about you."
We Got This Covered "Imagine the Fire" a lengthy interconnected essay on The Dark Knight Rises.
Natasha VC Christopher Nolan has a little Cousin Matthew in him, huh?
Forbes on The Dark Knight's political conservativism.
Digital Spy Anne Hathaway on the possibility of a Catwoman spin off. Given that she doesn't want to do it without Chris Nolan it's never going to happen (see also La Pfeiffer's stance in the 90s about Catwoman IF it was with Tim Burton)
Reader Comments (21)
Ugh. That Forbes article is so gross, but it makes a point that has been largely ignored by the critical masses who are in love with Nolan's latest. It is undoubtably a conservative film that toes the line of condemning the recent Occupy movement as an act of anarchy. For all of the liberal bloggers and filmgoers I know who loved this film unapologetically, not one has brought up what appear to be his very controversial politics.
And really, the only way Kristen Stewart could be like Jodie Foster is if she comes out as a secret lesbian in twenty years.
Christopher Nolan's not a conservative, he's a deer in the headlights.
Oh, I totally noticed how conservative TDKR was when I was watching it and it kind of turned me off a little ...
i'm french ,i know my french history and i was at London during London riots last year so you think Nolan nails on his "conservatism"
frenchgirl -- ???
Philip -- i noticed it too. also turned me off.
Wow...I expected more from you guys (I assume the people who visit this site are smart). The politics in The Dark Knight Rises don't lean one way or the other, conservative or liberal. And that right there is the problem with this country. Everything is right or left, red or blue, liberal or conservative. Not everything is partisan, people. They make it very clear in the movie (and the movies prior) that the higher-ups of Gotham are corrupt. They also make it clear that Bane's "Occupy Gotham" plan is not their goal, that all of it just a ruse so that he can take over the city and carry out the true goal.
Get over yourselves, liberals and conservatives.
TB-true, though I doubt it since Stewart was having an affair with a married man. Isn't the only confirmed hetero encounter for Jodie Foster 'Rob Lowe circa 1985.' An encounter all of us would have signed on for, regardless of your sexuality.
Sad news. German actress Susanne Lothar died on Wednesday at the age of 51. She was in so many great movies!
Sergi Lopez was so good in Harry. I saw that in theaters my sophomore year of high school, and I can still remember his face in the rest stop bathroom so well. [that's a funny last half of a sentence]
Susanna Lothar is dead? Fucking Arno Frisch. But seriously, I'm sad to hear that. I always considered her as the German Isabelle Huppert.
I've already heard people comparing kristen to jodie, and not as a compliment. I agree they have some similarities.
Aw, look at you making a Mariah pun! Sweet thing.
Sorry, but when I hear liberals complaining that TDKR condemns OWS or is inherently conservative in its politics, it just reeks of defensiveness to me. Just because Republicans think Bane's actions vindicate their caricature of the left doesn't mean liberals have to agree.
Unless y'all secretly agree that OWS was advocating anarchy and mob rule, that is...
I have trouble with the complaints about the Occupy Wall Street "parallels" only because that aspect of TDKR is to me so clearly a riff on the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror. Nolan practically beats you over the head with it at the end of the movie with the quote from A Tale of Two Cities.
Well sure but why is he beating us over the head with riffs on the French Revolution right now at this moment in time? Anyway I think the movie's politics are as muddled as everything else about it and trying to sort out a coherent thought from it's foolishness altogether. Nolan has no patience for little people with their little problems in these movies anyway - they're just there to be manipulated and victimized amidst the grand rotating schemes, which click into place on a big fat zero at the end.
The concept for The Butler is a direct reference to the 1979 miniseries Backstairs at the White House, which I loved. It was made on the heels of Roots with many of the same African American actors. The cast was stellar. The miniseries got 11 Emmy nominatios (six of them for acting). I loved it at the time.
JA--But that doesn't make any sense to me. Are you saying that he chose the French Revolution (and really, it's more the Reign of Terror he's playing on) because it parallels Occupy Wall Street? Because it doesn't. Not even close. Seriously, anyone who thinks that is doing a blatant disservice to OWS. I don't see how anyone who knows anything about the Terror could think that OWS compares to it in the slightest outside of "the disenfranchised fight back." Which, as it turns out, could apply to about a hundred different events in the course of human history.
I think this is a major case of people seeing what they want to see and coming up with elaborate explanations to justify it rather than just looking at the most obvious answer. It's like claiming that Batman Begins is a defense of Scientology because it features a crazy psychologist.
Liz I do not disagree with anything you said; I just think that Nolan is most certainly using the French Revolution etc. to reflect upon The World Today, and making a big bungle out of it as he tries... and in the meantime doing himself as you call it "a blatant disservice to OWS." I think he's the one mixing his messages. But it seems pretty clear, and has from his first Batman, that he's using these movies to reflect on our current political slash financial nightmares; he isn't just telling a story based on the Terror out of thin air. He wants these movies to seem Important - heck that's what his defenders love him for. I just think he paints things up with messages that he doesn't always follow through on or let's get away from him. This one more than most.
The scripting and production of this movie predates Occupy Wall Street.
Sean C: If production started AND ended before OWS, I'd buy that the dramatic scenes weren't changed in the middle of production to reflect those events. As it didn't (November), I'm inclined to believe that a significant portion of the dramatic meat of the movie might have been subjected to a very hasty re-write in the middle of production.
Also: Hathaway wants Chris Nolan "involved". Theoretically, that could mean just being writer or producer and, considering how strongly his stamp reverberates off that dumbly muted Man of Steel trailer, it seems like either he's a fairly hands on producer or people don't want to make something too "un-Nolany" if he's attached in any capacity.