Yes No Maybe So: "First Man"

by Nathaniel R

Raise your hand in the comments if you needed this month of enticing trailers. I sure did. There have been too many weeks this spring and early summer where too few interesting options appeared in movie theaters asking for our money. Suddenly June's onslaught of teasing has led us to hope that 2018 will turn itself into a stellar film year... and thus a competitive Oscar season to come. We've already discussed A Star is Born, White Boy Rick, The Children Act, Suspiria, Widows, Mowgli, and Christopher Robin. Now we have the latest from Oscar winning young director Damien Chazelle (Whiplash, La La Land) and it's the historical drama First Man about Neil Armstrong (Ryan Gosling) and the moon landing.

As with A Star is Born before it, this trailer lives up to the movie's 'on paper' promise and will only feed into more pre-release Oscar hype. Let's Yes No and Maybe So™ it after the jump...

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Showbiz History: Anne & Ellen, Liz & Dick, Rosemary & Baby

Here's what was happening on this day in showbiz history...

1930 Jim Nabors (aka Gomer Pyle) born in Alabama

1942 Anne Frank receives a diary for her 13th birthday. The diary will become world famous and receive multiple stage and film adaptations, most famously in the Oscar nominated '59 version from director George Stevens.

1963 Cleopatra has its premiere in New York City after years of tabloid sensations during the making of courtesy of Liz & Dick. Ever courting controversy, Liz & Dick did not attend the premiere!

1965 Actress Cathy Tyson (niece of Cicely!) born in Liverpool. She'll make a big splash (and receive a Golden Globe nomination) for her film debut in Mona Lisa when she's just 21...

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25th Anniversary Memoir: "Jurassic Park"

by Lynn Lee

June 1993.  It was my birthday, and I’d invited a group of my girl friends over for a small celebration that would include a movie outing.  I don’t remember exactly why I picked Jurassic Park.  I hadn’t read the book, I wasn’t yet a full-on movie buff, I didn’t like scary movies, and I wasn’t really into dinosaurs.  Yet something about the tremendous buzz surrounding this “adventure 65 million years in the making” must have penetrated my social bubble because I remember us all being excited to see it.

Whatever our expectations were, Jurassic Park blew them away.  From the moment that opening eerie chorus and single bamboo flute dissolved into the rustle of an unknown, unseen thing in a crate that within three minutes lay savage waste to one unfortunate worker, we were all transfixed in our seats and couldn’t have moved if our lives had depended on it...

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Tony Awards 2018 in Review

Thirteen random thoughts on last night's Tony Awards.

• Glenda Jackson won the Emmy and two Oscars in the 1970s but after a three decade break from acting, she returns triumphant with a Tony win, giving her the Triple Crown!

• Remember when Melissa McCarthy surprised everybody by winning the Emmy for Mike & Molly that one year? After the shock wore off everyone collectively decided that the Television Academy gave her that prize because of Bridesmaids that same season. I kinda think this is what happened with Laurie Metcalf winning a second consecutive Tony -- this time for Three Tall Women in a category people expected to go elsewhere. Not that Three Tall Women isn't brilliantly acted, but we're guessing her miracle performance in Lady Bird helped put her over the finish line. We're choosing to interpret it as Tony voters slapping Oscar's hand. Oscar deserved a slap for that one...

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Beauty vs Beast: Love Among the Dino Droppings

Jason from MNPP here - before I saw Call Me By Your Name in theaters 18 times this past winter the movie that held my personal record of "seen the most times seen in the theater" was Jurassic Park, which I saw in the theater 15 times in 1993. Meaning I can place where I was exactly 25 years ago today, since today's the 25th anniversary. I can also place where I was tomorrow 25 years ago, and the day after that 25 years ago, and the day after that 25 years ago... I saw it every single night for a straight week. It was my Star Wars.

Every progressive sequel's dulled the impact a bit more but that first movie, man I can still feel the tingle up my spine the first time the camera panned up that brachiosaurus and John Williams' music swelled and Spielberg cut to the distant dinos bathing themselves in the sparkling sunlight... it was like the four walls of the house my imagination lived inside of were kicked down all at once. Utter movie magic. Every kid that ever smashed their little dino figures together felt it. And yet the human characters kick ass too. With actors like this around...

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PREVIOUSLY Last week's Interview with the Vampire race stayed tight and vacillated often but it was Tom Cruise's Lestat who crawled out of the swamp and unto victory over Brad Pitt's Louis at the end. Said Jaragon:

"Lestat is a lot more fun and he gets the last bite."