C O N S I D E R - Favorites of 2017, 2nd Qtr

THE YEAR'S FIRST HALF IS OVER! But rather than wait for this "halfway mark" for year in review listicles we started at the end of the 1st quarter so you'll have to combine those lists (movies / actresses / actors) with the highlights from your host's April through June screenings for a complete "halfway mark" take. Got it? Unlike many critics orgs and the Oscars, The Film Experience believes that moviegoing is a 12 month long activity and each month can hold worthy efforts.  Here are 4 or 5 highlights of what we've seen the past three months per Oscar category in alpha order. How will they measure up to what's still to come?

Key movies I regret missing this quarter: Beatriz at Dinner, Hero, Gifted, Manifesto, and Their Finest

PICTURE and/or DIRECTOR and/or SCREENPLAY
(i couldn't decide which to cut so this first grouped selection is 6 wide)

BABY DRIVER (Edgar Wright)
THE BIG SICK (Michael Showalter)
THE LOVERS (Azazel Jacobs)
LOST CITY OF Z (James Gray)
THE WEDDING PLAN (Rama Burshtein)
WONDER WOMAN (Patty Jenkins)

Lots more after the jump...

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Bonne Fête, Bujold.

by Seán McGovern

Today we celebrate the 75th birthday of Québécoise actress Genevieve Bujold, one of the lesser-lauded Francophone talents. Apart from having a wonderful name to pronounce (dinner with Geneviève Bujold and René Auberjonois, perhaps?), she has more than 70 films under her belt. Instead of doing a retrospective of an actresses who not all of us might know or appreciate, consider this an introduction to some of her greatest work, including Anne of a Thousand Days, Dead Ringers and of course, not Star Trek: Voyager.

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The Many Delights of "Okja"

Chris here. Have you caught up to Okja on Netflix yet, readers?

The Cannes competition title arrived on the streaming platform this week (and a tiny sampling of theatres), becoming one of its boldest and best pieces of original programming. Bong Joon-ho's satire of the factory farming industry and consumer culture is a stunning blend of tones and ideas, from absurd comedy to tense thriller to heartwarming fable. At its heart, it is truly about a girl and her pet.

Okja is quite a feast for audiences, bursting with delights both unexpected and well-anticipated. The film has naturally proven somewhat divisive already, as anything so go-for-broke typically can be. But let's grant some hosannas for a film of many high points...

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Young and Hungry Susan Hayward

HAYWARD CENTENNIAL FINALE

by Nathaniel R

Oscar buffs might be the only people who still regularly talk about Susan Hayward but her Oscar record was impressive enough to warrant that conversation. Five nominations with one win, all in the Best Actress category, is not nothing. In fact, her record is a match with Audrey Hepburn and Anne Bancroft and another Susan (Sarandon). But when I first got interested in Susan Hayward before I'd seen any of her films, what drew me in was the abundant hysteria within the posters, titles, and taglines for her movies. Or to quote Rupert Everett in My Best Friend's Wedding:

The misery. The exquisite tragedy. The Susan Hayward of it all!"

She lived (onscreen at least) for exclamation points so it's fitting then that her Oscar win came from I Want to Live! (1958). But to close out our celebration counterintuitively in reverse, let's end with a film from when Hayward was a young and hungry actress without much pull...

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Olivia de Havilland Sues "Feud"

Photo by Damon Winter via LA TimesHere's a deliciously fitting coda to the first season of Ryan Murphy's Feud. Olivia de Havilland, who was played by Catherine Zeta-Jones (in a bewilderingly bad performance given CZJ's talent!), is suing Ryan Murphy and FX for the unauthorized use of her identity! She definitely did not like being portrayed on the bitchy side. Her lawyer says:

...the FX series puts words in the mouth of Miss de Havilland which are inaccurate and contrary to the reputation she has built over an 80-year professional life, specifically refusing to engage in gossip mongering about other actors in order to generate media attention for herself."

While Bette Davis's daughter B.D. (played by Kiernan Shipka) and one of Joan Crawford's twin girls Catherine (played by Chelsea Summer) are still alive, Olivia is the only celebrity portrayed in Feud: Bette vs Joan who is still living (aside from a couple of cameos like actors depicting Eva Marie Saint and Rip Torn if you want to get nitpicky). The two time Oscar winner, who we celebrated festively this time last year, turns 101 tomorrrow. Her birthday wish is apparently to stick one to FX. If she really wanted to do damage she might've announced this before Emmy voting closed, though.