Thoughts I Had... While Rewatching "Grease 2"

Grease 2 gave me such writer's block in the Pfandom series because what to even focus on with such an event? I finally powered through but the focus naturally had to be on LaPfeiff's career. So, herewith a random collections of thoughts and observations from this viewing which I think was my 6th or 7th? The movie is terrible but I'm addicted to early Pfeiffer's lusty bravado in it, hence the multiple revisits.

(This is gif heavy so be warned...)

Dody Goodman & Eve Arden reprising their Grease roles as "Blanche & Miss McGee"

↑ But these are the faces you'll find me making every time I find myself watching it. WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS AGAIN?!?!?

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The Owl and the Pussycat

Or, "Alicia Vikander and Feathered Friend" but that doesn't have as much of a cinematic ring to it. Oh, and there are two new photos of Vikander as Lara Croft after the jump, the first official ones...

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Doc Corner: Meet the Girls of 'All This Panic'

“It’s just one of those things when you expect something to be amazing and perfect and it’s not.”

Those words are spoken by 16-year-old Lena in Jenny Gage’s gorgeous slice of life documentary, All This Panic, as she describes the feeling of liking a boy who didn’t like her back. Never mind that, though; aren’t they a perfect encapsulation of the teenage existence more generally? Lena is just one of a handful of teenage female subjects that Gage and her cinematographer husband Tom Betterton stumble upon in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn; the experiences of whom make up this exquisite debut feature.

Lena, socially forward but with a struggling family life, is joined by sisters Ginger and Dusty, Gage and Betterton’s neighbours, the elder of which has little concept of where she wants her life to go and confesses to being “petrified of getting old”; Sage, a rare African American student at a prestigious Manhattan school whose outspoken attitude is coupled with an internal battle between her class status and her face; and Olivia, who confides to the camera about her sexuality before she ever would her parents.

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Barry Jenkins Brings "Railroad" to Amazon

Chris here. Now that the dust has settled from the Oscar telecast snafu, we can just linger in the joy of a black queer microbudgeted film like Moonlight having won Best Picture. And after the film's emotionally immersive success I think it's safe to say that of all of last year's lauded filmmakers, the one that we're most clammoring to see the next project is Barry Jenkins.

Well get ready for him to transfer Moonlight's episodic structure into some actual episodes: the Oscar-winner will be writing and directing an adaptation of Colson Whitehead's "The Underground Railroad" for Amazon as a limited series. The novel follows Cora and Caesar, two slaves who find a literal subterranean train system on her journey to freedom in 1800s America. Already a National Book Award winner, the gorgeous prose is a perfect fit for Jenkins's attentive and comprehensive touch (I started the book this past weekend myself).

Considering Oprah selected it for her intermitent book club, one wonders if she'll also be lending her cache to at least the production team (the Moonlight producing team is also on board). For casting, while you can imagine actors lining up to work with Jenkins, but if there is one thing to hope carries over from Moonlight it's the sense of discovery he brings to a breakthrough ensemble. Have you read the novel yet?

Pfandom: Cool Rider and a Pink (Leading) Lady

on the set of Grease 2, her first lead roleP F A N D O M  
Michelle Pfeiffer Retrospective. Episode 8 
by Nathaniel R 

We've mostly focused on Michelle Pfeiffer's acting in our Pfandom retrospective. We're sure the star who has described herself as "extremely private" would like it that way, but this would be the appropriate time for a brief bit of personal context.

Though the young actress had been working nonstop since the late 70s in television roles and a few features, she'd been struggling offscreen. She was impatient with the way her career was developing. She'd also become involved with a cult, an experience she's always been cagey about in interviews. She had given them too much of her money and was eating strangely at their insistence. In 1981, she took back control of her life.

At the Grease 2 premiere in NYC with her new husband Peter Horton and producer Allan Carr

Two marriages and two divorces (of sorts): in her personal life she fell in love with fellow up-and-coming actor Peter Horton (who would later become a TV star on thirtysomething), and broke free from the cult; in her professional life she dumped her first agent to sign with the much more powerful William Morris Agency. The shakeup had an immediate effect on her career...

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