Eva Green's Peculiar Children and Geena Davis Returning to TV

Laurence here with a couple of juicy actress news tidbits. After a string of well-cast disappointments, we're all hoping for a return to Tim Burton magic this year with his new film Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. We finally have some images from the film, which has what might be Burton's most formidable (live-action) cast since Big Fish, including Judi Dench, Samuel L. Jackson, Allison Janney, Terence Stamp, Kim Dickens and Rupert Everett. Whoa.

Most importantly, though, here's Eva Green in the title role. [More...]

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2016's Tentative Calendar

We'll begin awardable speculations all over again starting April 1st as we do. Don't hate us because we're OCD. So I'm prepping a cheat sheet list of releases that could factor in in ways very minor or major. Let me know if I've missed any juicy titles you're awaiting after the jump.

January through April
Which ones will people still care about in 10 months when top ten lists / awards season begins
10 Cloverfield Lane, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, The Boss, Demolition, Everybody Wants Some, Hail Caesar!, Hello My Name is Doris, A Hologram for the King, The Huntsman: Winter's War, Krisha, The Meddler, Midnight Special, Miles Ahead, Sing Street, Tale of Tales, The Witch, and Zootopia

Popcorn Season (May-August)
Some Oscar nominees always emerge in the summer. But the question is in which categories?
Alice Through the Looking Glass, Ben-Hur, The BFG, A Bigger Splash, Captain America: Civil War, Captain Fantastic, The Conjuring 2, Finding Dory, The Founder, Genius, Ghostbusters, Hands of Stone, High Rise, Independence Day: Resurgence, Jason Bourne, Kubo & The Two Strings, Last Days in the Desert, The Legend of Tarzan, Money Monster,  Pete's Dragon, The Secret Life of Pets, Star Trek Beyond, Suicide Squad, Warcraft, X-Men: Apocalypse

Festival Friendly (Sept-October)
October & November are now the best months for release (statistically) if you'd like to win Best Picture
The Accountant, The Birth of a Nation, Bridget Jones Baby, Deepwater Horizon, Girl on the Train, The Light Between Oceans, Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, A Monster Calls, Storks, Sully, Snowden, 

Holidays (November-December).
December continues to be the most popular month to schedule Oscar hopefuls though no eventual winner has been released that late since 2004. Still, it's usually good for way too many Oscar nominations even if few wins come of them... 
Assassin's Creed, Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, Collateral Beauty, Doctor Strange, Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them, Lion, La La Land, Moana, Passengers, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Sing, Trolls, Untitled Robert Zemeckis / Brad Pitt World War II Film

Liam Neeson in Martin Scorsese's Silence 

Have Yet to be Scheduled But Expected in 2016
20th Century Women (Mike Mills directs The Bening and other stars)
Charming (animated comedy about the Prince's multiple storybook romances)
A Tale of Love and Darkness (Natalie Portman)
Silence (Martin Scorsese directs Liam Neeson, Andrew Garfield, Etc...)
The Last Face (Charlize Theron & Javier Bardem)
The Book of Henry (Naomi Watts, Lee Pace, Jacob Tremblay)
The Zookeepers Wife (Jessica Chastain, WW II drama)
Gold (Matthew McConaughey)
Suite Francaise (Michelle Williams... this is still out there somewhere. It's been finished for how long?)
The Queen of Katwe (Mira Nair directs Lupita Nyong'o)
A United Kingdom (Rosamund Pike & David Oyelowo)
Untitled Howard Hughes Project (Warren Beatty, Alec Baldwin, Lily Collins, The Bening)
Loving (Jeff Nichols directs Joel Edgerton & Ruth Negga, true story)
LBJ (Rob Reiner directs Woody Harrelson in the biopic) 
Untitled Woody Allen (Blake Lively, Kristen Stewart, Steve Carell) 
The Seagull (Saoirse Ronan, Corey Stoll, and The Bening in a Chekov adaptation) 
Beat-up Little Seagull (Michelle Pfeiffer) 
The Lost City of Z (James Gray directs Tom Holland and Charlie Hunnam in 1920s jungle exploration) 
HHhH (Rosamund Pike, Mia Wasikowska, Jason Clarke in WW II thriller)  
War Machine (David Michôd directs Brad Pitt in Afghan war satire)
Nocturnal Animals (Tom Ford directs Amy Adams & Jake Gyllenhaal. Based on the book "Tony & Susan") 
The Secret Scripture (Jim Sheridan directs Rooney Mara & Vanessa Redgrave in mental hospital drama) 
Una (Rooney Mara & Ben Mendelsohn)
The Whole Truth (Courtney Hunt directs Keanu Reeves & Gugu Mbatha-Raw)
Our Kind of Traitor (Damian Lewis & Naomie Harris) 
Manchester by the Sea (Kenneth Lonergan directs Casey Affleck & Michelle Williams)
Certain Women (Kelly Reichardt directs Kristen Stewart & Michelle Williams)
Tallulah (Ellen Page & Allison Janney)
Trespass Against Us (Michael Fassbender & Brendan Gleeson)
Alone in Berlin (Brendan Gleeson & Emma Thompson) 
The Promise (Terry George directs Christian Bale & Oscar Isaac & Charlotte Le Bon in Ottoman Empire love triangle) 
The Circle (James Ponsoldt directs Emma Watson & Tom Hanks) 

Intended for 2017 but they're already filming so you never know...
Live by Night (Ben Affleck directs Prohibition Era crime story)
Miss Sloane (Jessica Chastain)
The Snowman (Tomas Alfredson directs Michael Fassbender)
Trainspotting 2 (the whole cast returns)
All Eyez on Me (Tupac Shakur bio) 
The Dinner (Oren Moverman directs Richard Gere & The Lovely Laura Linney)

Bewitched, Bothered, and Be Link-ed

Thrillist Best Movies of 2016. haha. I don't know exactly how this column is going to work but I'm curious to find out
THR an interview with producer Irwin Winkler on Martin Scorsese's Silence and the Creed sequel
Frontier an oral history of "The Golden Girls"
Twitter Why Leo waited until just now to win an Oscar 

Nick Flicks Picks are you following his supporting actress project? The gold numbers reflect full performance reviews
Guardian Fans keep trying to restore Star Wars (1977) because George Lucas doesn't want
Film Mix Tape praises Michelle Visage as RuPaul's Drag Race returns (TONITE. WHEEEE)
Comics Alliance if you want to have yet another superhero's cameo in Batman v Superman spoiled for you, here is the info
Deadline How Mark Rylance won the Oscar without any campaigning
AV Club Disney's next animated feature will be an adaptation of The Nutcracker 
i09 a fan film about Darth Maul, the only good thing to emerge from that second Star Wars trilogy 
Variety an interview with Julian Fellowes on the series finale of Downton Abbey. Good stuff. Between the exits of Mad Men and now Downton, I have so few shows that feel like they're a part of my life (from staying power) left.

Read Only if You've Seen The Witch
If you've already seen The Witch I'd recommend reading these two takes on its most riveting scenes and primarily its divisive ending and the subversive extent of the femininism within the film. Salon's look at Thomasin as a "Final Girl laced into a puritan bodice" is great and a piece at Vague Visages takes a more mixed tack. Angelica Jade Bastién grapples with what she feels is unearned about the film's jawdropping finale:

I love the film, but how feminist can The Witch be if Thomasin remains primarily a cipher? 

Beauty vs Beast: Man Made Woman

Jason from MNPP here, hoping y'all have by now nursed your Oscar hangovers from last week, whether literal or figurative, and are feeling at least somewhat happy about what won (or maybe what didn't win - no judgment here) this year. I go into the show as cynical as a storm cloud every year but there was a long stretch in the middle of the show, as Mad Max swept up everything in sight like one of its desert twisters, where I was making many happy noises, and that's as good as it ever gets.

But my happiest noise of all issued forth (kind of an ecstatic coo, you might call it) at the night's biggest surprise, which our friend Manuel gave good love to right after the show -- Ex Machina's out-of-nowhere win for Best Special Effects over a crowd of popular behemoths. Those gears glowing and shimmering inside Ava's mid-section were low-key, gorgeous movie magic, and there's one image in the film (of a robot's self-abuse) that I won't be forgetting any time soon.

That said it seems time to finally place the Woman against her Maker here in our "Beauty vs Beast" series; I'd have nominated both of these actors for their performances myself, so this will contest of ours have to suffice...

It's been a couple of weeks since our last edition, which faced off the Witches of Oz in honor of the release of The Witch, but I don't know about you - I still haven't stopped thinking and talking about The Witch. Anyway as for Oz it was a blow-out for her beautiful wickedness herself - The Wicked Witch of the West walked away with over 80% of your vote! Take that, goody-two-shoes Glinda. Said Yavor (sharing the sorts of factoids that make TFE great):

"Nicole Kidman says that watching the WWOTW was what first made her want to act."

Ask Nathaniel. And "Best Shot" Scheduling Notes

Time for another Q&A Column. So ask away. I'll pick 10 questions to answer for Wednesday evening. We'll try to do this weekly. Now that the Oscars have wrapped it's time to get back to something like a regular schedule (though we're still working out the kinks backstage. There's always something happening here at TFE is the point so visit us daily.)

Hit Me With Your Best Shot Schedule

TOMORROW
GHOSTBUSTERS (1984) If you're playing along post your best shot by 9 PM EST so we can include you in the round up. (Amazon Prime)

• Tues March 15th ATONEMENT (2007) revisit Saoirse Ronan's breakthrough before Brooklyn in this Best Picture nominated romantic drama (Netflix Instant Watch)
• Tues March 22nd TBA
• Tues March 29th ZARDOZ (1974) a Sci-Fi oddity starring Sean Connery & Charlotte Rampling & Unfortunate Costumes
• Tues April 5th GREGORY PECK CENTENNIAL Pick either Roman Holiday (1950) or To Kill a Mockingbird (1962), whichever you'd like. They were both nominated for the Cinematography Oscar in their years. (Netflix Instant Watch)