15:17 to Link

• IndieWire Hirokazu Kore-eda's The Truth starring Ethan Hawke, Juliette Binoche, and Catherine Deneuve to open the Venice Film Festival
• The Guardian on the rise of millenial filmmakers -- they're just beginning
• /Film a rare straight-to-series order for a new sitcom from the 30 Rock team - Ted Danson & Tina Fey will star
• Variety why audiences are only going to Disney movies
• /Film the new Mortal Kombat movie will be going for a violent "R" rating
• The Guardian terrific actress Billie Piper is now a director, too. Her first film Rare Beasts is going to Venice. She calls it an anti-rom-com

• Coming Soon Dark Crystal Age of Resistance gets a sneak peek via ComicCon
• Film School Rejects offers up a handy list of forthcoming action films that are directed by women
• BuzzFeed "Euphoria" and the meaning of penises onscreen via the only context in which we're ever shown them. 
• AV Club Archer renewed for an 11th season - this time he'll be back to espionage?
• Deadline Brandon Routh, who had the misfortune of being cast as Superman in a bad Superman movie (Superman Returns) gets to put the cape back on for the CW.
• Gr8ter Days TV's Hart to Hart celebrating its 40th anniversary
• Hard Times "James Corden prepared for 'Cats' role by living as obnoxious creature for decades"
• Gold Derby a nearly decade-long trend suggests a Billy Porter or Kit Harrington win for Best Actor
• Variety Two Emmy nominations revoked from Better Call Saul in the short form categories. We think they need much stricter rules about short form because it's starting to seem like a way to just give regular series extra prizes for bite-sized things (instead of honoring shows that are born and intended for the short form) 
• Refinery 29 a new interview with Madonna as she premieres another music video from Madame X "Batuka"

"San Juan Hill"

Pictures taken directly outside my front door today. omg, WEST SIDE STORY ("san juan hill" surely isn't foolin' anybody) is filming on the street where I live. My friend, after talking to some neighbors, believes the main filming business is going to be happening about two blocks from us (something about gels over apartment windows) so we probably won't be able to see a dancer number outside the window but we can always dream.

UPDATE: more photos after the jump

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Best "Cats" Tweets

We haven't shared a Twitter roundup in months so herewith, our favourite tweets on Cats.

It was so hard to choose y'all since the timeline has been Cats for like 24 hours. The trailer has already really inspired the silly. Hopefully the movie itself will prove just as worthwhile from a social media perspective...

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Yes, No, Maybe So: "Cats" (and personal "Cats" histories)

by Nathaniel R

All longform discussions of the trailer to Cats must be prefaced with one's own history with the Andrew Lloyd Webber megahit. It's the law. This is why no matter how insane the movie may appear, no matter how much it be instantly mocked on the internet, it will have (at least) a gigantic box office opening. The megamusical has been a phenomenon since 1981, grossing literally billions of dollars on stage, winning awards and selling millions of albums (back when people actually bought such things) with the hit song "Memory" being covered by hundreds upon hundreds of musicians thereafter. 

Cats was my first Broadway touring show which I saw in Detroit (presumably at the Fox Theatre?) as a kid. My parents bought me the t-shirt and later for Christmas the Original Cast Recording. On my first ever trip to NYC in 1989 (?) it was then my first Broadway show. I know I know... I was once a typical tourist who saw something he'd already seen *shakes head at self* while in New York when other surely better and newer things were playing. I was so obsessed Cats that I learned "Memory" on the piano and named my next two kittens "Mistoffles" and "Rumpleteaser". How young and foolish and easily manipulated I was by splashy worldwide sensations as a child. And yet from the 1990s onward I've barely thought of it but for whenever discussions of a possible movie version would come up, most notably all the joking in Six Degrees of Separation (1993).

Okay that's my history. You must share yours (it's the law) and since Cats is such an event brand, we must do the Yes No Maybe So™ breakdown after the jump in real time screencaps rather than trifurcating with our yes, no maybe so headings. Ready?

To quote Judi Dench as "Old Deuteronomy"...

We're about to begin

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How are the nominees introduced in their movies? (A Smackdown '60 appetizer)

The Smackdown panel is meeting this Sunday to finalize the voting and record our conversation. All five films are available on either YouTube or Amazon but for Dark at the Top of the Stairs which you can watch on the link included below. Watch the movies and vote!

While you wait for the Smackdown and its Podcast, we thought we'd do a little exercize we haven't done in a while. Let's look at how the filmmakers introduce these characters within the overall stories. Bear in mind that these aren't the lead characters, so theroetically they don't have to be introduced in a "stop and look at this person!"" kind of way. But were the filmmakers underlining their entrances, preparing you to embrace an future-Oscar-nominated-star-turn, or just going about telling the stories? 

Let's investigate in the order they show up in their movies...

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