Showbiz History: Wrecking Balls, Two Commandments, and Makeup & Hair Nods

8 random things that happened on this day (November 23rd) in showbiz history

1923 Cecil B DeMille's The Ten Commandments premieres. He would of course remake it as the infinitely better-remembered 1956 camp? technicolor classic of the same name.

1934 Romantic drama The Painted Veil starring Greta Garbo and Herbert Marshall opens in movie theaters. It's later remade (quite well!) in 2006 with Naomi Watts and Edward Norton.

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All Oscar Charts Updated: "The Favourite" and "Black Panther" Rising

As a special Thanksgiving gift to all of you, we've updated all the Oscar charts.  

The Favourite In theaters tomorrow! DO NOT MISS IT.

BEST PICTURE
The box office this weekend and so many openings and/or guild screenings this week (Roma and The Favourite both in limited release, Green Book going wide, Vice and Mary Poppins and Mary Queen of Scots screenings) etcetera will likely disrupt this chart, as will the impending NYFCC and NBR decisions, but here's what we're thinking right now...

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Salim Gives Thanks

Team Experience members were invited to give thanks this week so you'll be hearing from a few of us. Here's Salim Garami...

What's good?

2018 has proven to be a very busy year for yours truly, hence my radio silence here in The Film Experience (I didn't have much time to write on my own personal blog Motorbreath). But it has also proven to be a surprisingly rewarding year for me, both in my personal life after much hassle earlier in the year and run-around later in the year (I have been going back-and-forth between not two but THREE U.S. cities for professional reasons) and in cinema

I think 2018 has been one of the best moviegoing years I've experienced in my whole life. So many surprises and experiments, so many crowdpleasers where I am proudly on that bandwagon, a couple of Oscar contenders that I actually enjoyed. And there's no shortage of music, television, or literature from this year amusing me in some way or another as well so let's dig in...

• Comedic songwriter/teleplay writer/critical writer extraordinaire Demi Adeyugibe has blessed us with not one but TWO funny "fake" credit songs for the nerdiest tentpoles of the summer: Future imitation "Snap" for Avengers: Infinity War and the compulsively catchy Childish Gambino imitation in "L-A-N-D-O" for Solo: A Star Wars Story.

• Tom Cruise trying to figure out where the "payload" is at and finding a giant switch saying "payload" in the helicopter chase climax of Mission: Impossible - Fallout...

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Months of Meryl: The Giver (2014)

John and Matthew are watching every single live-action film starring Meryl Streep. 

#47 —The Chief Elder, leader of a dystopian society.

MATTHEW: In Lois Lowry’s 1993 young adult novel The Giver, a society recovering from near-ruination divides its people into communities and, in the process, mistakes sameness for equality. In the 2014 film adaptation of Lowry’s Newbery Medal-winning classic, a production team looking to make a quick buck on the under-18 set mistakes glossy superficiality for storytelling simplicity and basic filmmaking competency. Despite its undeniable following and long-held status as a formative literary staple for American adolescents, The Giver was somehow omitted from my middle school reading list. I’m positive Lowry’s tale has its merits, but whatever those may be, they are almost entirely undetectable in this version from journeyman director Phillip Noyce (Rabbit-Proof Fence, The Quiet American).

Noyce’s iteration centers around Jonas (Australian twink Brenton Thwaites), a 16-year-old who we are told possesses uncommon brilliance and “a capacity to see beyond,” assets that earn him the title of his community’s Receiver of Memory...

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Nathaniel Gives Thanks

Team Experience members were invited to give thanks this week so you'll be hearing from a few of us. Here's your host Nathaniel R... 

2018 was an unusually hard year for your host, given that he was starting over in his offline life after a painful breakup so first things first. I'm so goddamn grateful for The Film Experience. Thank YOU all for reading (especially those who donate to keep us on life support- see sidebar) and for being such a faithful community. This labor of love site is a continual source of pleasure and stability for me personally and I always aim to make it so for you, too. Before I get to the individual entertainment gratitude I also want to thank the Team Experience regulars: Murtada, Chris, Jason, Glenn, Jorge, Lynn, Eric, Dancin' Dan, Spencer, John & Matthew, and those we don't hear from much at the moment (life is so rude like that) but who we're always happy to work with like Nick, Ilich, Salim, Tim, Deborah, Séan, Daniel, Ben, Katey, and Joe. And both warm hugs to those who've moved on and nervous waving at those yet to come; they're out there somewhere and must make themselves known soon!

I will now attempt to give entertainment thanks without completely repeating my esteemed colleagues in their fun posts even though I love several of the movies they already spoke of. Okay in 2018 I was ever so grateful for:

• The continual shapeshifting of A Simple Favor from comedy to noir to mystery to camp spectacle to romcom to satire. It was such a great film to take friends to since it was so funny and surprising and memorable with it genre juggling. And Blake Lively's ultra modern wardrobe paired with Old Hollywood star charisma was something else... 

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