Soundtracking: "The Bodyguard"

Whitney: Can I Be Me debuts this Friday on Showtime. Chris Feil takes a look at the icon's biggest soundtrack...

The Bodyguard doesn’t deserve its iconic mega-selling soundtrack. Granted, most of us have never pretended that that the film was even a whiff as good as all that glorious vocal dexterity Whitney Houston lays into her six tracks. But rest assured: the movie itself is even worse than you remember.

Among its many sins, the most egregious is how it ignores its own musical assets. The Bodyguard exists in a world where you can enter someone’s home and just happen upon an extended dance sequence being shot for a music video - but it also presents a world where that isn’t anywhere near as fun as it sounds. It spends the first act under the illusion that we give a crap about five or six things more than we do about Whitney’s voice. Why go to the creative effort to cast one of the biggest music acts of the era (and in a quasi-musical!) if you don’t know how to use her?

No sweat for Whitney, even if her acting performance netted her some harsh reviews. As ever, her musical contribution remains untouchable...

Click to read more ...

Emmy Review: Outstanding Period/Fantasy Costumes

by Nathaniel R

The television Academy split up the costume categories at the Emmys just a few years ago. Given that all awards bodies default to period work over contemporary work if they have a choice between the two (sigh) it's good that they did this. Now contemporary costumes will be able to actually win prizes! This period category, then, feels more like a continuation of the original Emmy category "Outstanding Costumes for a Series"

The nominees are...

Click to read more ...

The Top 100 Comedies: Screwball Dames and Male Auteurs

by Seán McGovern

The limit of list culture is the absolute bias of the person compiling it (except of course the Dewey Decimal System which is without imperfection). To compile theirs, the BBC polled 253 film critics - 118 women and 135 men -  from 52 countries to determine what exactly are the "100 Greatest Comedies".

It's good to look at these lists to remind ourselves that since the majority of films are made by men, so too is the work that's considered both the funniest and the best. Right-on caveat aside, some great, female-centred comedies make the list: 2016's Toni Erdmann at 59; Mean Girls, which we can now call a modern classic, at 57; and Clueless (iconic) at a very healthy 34...

Click to read more ...

link to the feeling

• Film Doctor UK good interview with a action film storyboard artist
• IndieWire David Ehrlich makes a great case that Oscar needs to change their rules about Original Song. "Cut to the Feeling" from Leap is not eligible (incidentally for the same reason "Come What May" wasn't eligible... originally written for something else and then unused for that something else)
• Variety Morgan Freeman will be this year's SAG Lifetime Achievement Recipient
• NYT and LAT remember the career of movie & television star Jerry Lewis (RIP)

• AV Club more drama for that Han Solo movie. Michael K Williams, currently Emmy nominated for The Night Of, has had his entire part cut out.
• Deadline another new role for Roland Møller (in the action film Skyscraper). The Danish actor is hot hot hot after Land of Mine. You'll understand if you've seen that Oscar nominated picture
• The Guardian we're promised a definitive victor in the forthcoming action film Godzilla vs Kong. But either way audiences probably lose.

TV
• Variety the annual survey of who makes what per episode of hit TV shows. Casts of Big Bang Theory, Game of Thrones, Modern Family, and Robert DeNiro (in a new series) are swimming in money. Cast of This is Us will surely eventually be but not quite yet.
• Out RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars season 3 is a go... and already filming!
• Variety Peak TV still hasn't peaked. At least in terms of quantity. One executive predicts 534 new series next year so you're not just imagining that it's impossible to keep up
• Coming Soon 'everything we know about Star Trek Discovery'... though can someone explain to me the deal with this. I keep hearing that it'll be on Netflix and that Netflix is distributing. Yet often times and sometimes even in the same single paragraph in various articles it will say "exclusively on CBS All Access" so I'm confused. Anyone?

Off-Screen
Comic Book Resources fun article on that time that the Incredible Hulk could fly in the comics

Emmy Review: Best Actress, Limited Series or Movie

We've been reviewing Emmy categories. Voting concludes next Monday with the ceremony on September 17th.

by Eric Blume

Entertainment writers have been crowing for a while about this category, claiming that it looks more like a Best Actress Oscar list than it does an Emmy list.  And it’s true, this year’s six nominees include four women who have already won that Oscar, along with two of television’s biggest names.  It’s an embarrassment of riches: six interesting, surprising, deep performances from six formidable actors...

Click to read more ...