Burt Reynolds (1936-2018)

by Nathaniel R

Burt Reynolds in his iconic breakout role in "Deliverance"Burt Reynolds passed away today of a heart attack. He was 82 years old. Though he lived a long blessed life, it's always a bummer to lose a bonafide movie star. It was particularly exciting recently to learn he'd been cast in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019) since Quentin Tarantino has proven so skilled in the past at reviving talent whose heyday had passed and making us think about them differently or just think about them a lot again. Sadly, from our understanding he hadn't yet begun work so though the picture is currently filming they'll have to recast his supporting role. in the picture so it will need to be recast. 

Did you have any feelings about him?

I personally had to grow into Burt Reynolds. When you're a little kid you accept that whoever is a star is a massive star,  even if you don't know why, their origin story being firmly in the past.  When I became interested in movies (the mid 80s) he was already "over" and then when I did start seeing him I didn't get it at all, at least not at first...

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Popular No More

Let the joyous news at last be spread the wicked old wi popular achievement Oscar is dead!

As if the first full four-movie day of TIFF wasn't enjoyable enough (more on those films soon), after the screenings I finally heard the excessively wonderful news that you have surely already been celebrating at home all day: the Academy will not be proceeding with that "popular achievement Oscar" plan this year. This is not to say that the idea is totally dead... we know the board of governors liked it enough to announce it in the first place so it's probably lingering there like a malignant tumor BUT they're not proceeding this year. Perhaps they'll have more time to talk themselves out of it, now? If you missed our three discussions about all the things that were gross and problematic and delusional you can always click back to read and hear them. 

For now let's breath a huge sigh of relief, and pray that there's an even bigger miracle and they quit with that stupid plan to shove the craft categories into commercial breaks. 

WHAT OTHER GOOD NEWS HAVE YOU HEARD RECENTLY? LET'S LIFT EACH OTHER UP!

Blueprints: "Black Mirror: U.S.S. Callister"

Jorge continues to look into the Emmy nominees before the show on September 17th.

WARNING! Spoilers below for the Black Mirror episode "U.S.S. Callister"!

Black Mirror has to operate as an individual, stand-alone story in every episode. As an anthology series, there’s no cast of characters to follow through long arcs, no stories to pick up from, no built-in mythology or tone. In a way, this is incredibly freeing, as they can experiment as much as possible since he only thing that ties the episodes together is a theme. But being basically TV movies (which is what they submit themselves as with the Emmys), they also have to to the groundwork for the audience every time.

And it’s not simple groundwork. Black Mirror revolves around the dangers, consequences, benefits and untapped potential of technology. Elaborate worlds, complex gadgets, and characters living in somewhat alternate universes are built into its fabric. It’s always part of the journey to discover what terrifying side of our screen devices they’ll explore...

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I Heart Rosie

by Jason Adams

Nathaniel mentioned this in this morning's Showbiz History post but I wanted to take a longer moment to give longer love to Rosie Perez, who's turning 54 today. While Rosie still pops up in things every so often (hey look she's in Dee Rees' next movie!) I do wish it was more often than that - having come of age in the late 80s / early 90s I've got a deep affection for what she was serving after boxing herself right outta the gate with Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing in 1989.

Who amongst us can hear the word "quince" without remembering her Jeopardy contestant in White Men Can't Jump? All due apologies to Anna Paquin but Rosie was robbed at the 1994 Oscars if you ask me - her performance in Fearless (a film I consider a flat-out masterpiece, one that seems criminally under-valued) is one for the ages. Who would you have given the statue to that year?

survey software

Queer TIFF: "Touch Me Not"

TIFF kicks off today!! In addition to our regular coverage, Chris Feil will be covering a sampling of the festival's LGBTQ global cinema...

Adina Pintilie’s Golden Bear-winning piece of experimentation and sexual reflection Touch Me Not opens on a landscape of the naked male body, anonymous and alien, shot with a deliberate distance that doesn’t deceive the film’s tension between curiosity, impulse, and terror. While this quickly establishes the psyche of Pintilie’s piece, it is about to become far more personal, with its players all playing themselves or versions thereof. Its fourth wall is never broken because it was never built in the first place.

The film centers largely on two emotionally stunted characters (or “characters”), struggling to experience both physical and emotional connection...

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