What's on your cinematic mind + 'Ask Nathaniel'

Thank you dear readers for your patience during this past month's quiet period. Your host here is off to catch a flight to Middleburg in an hour but I'll aim for daily reports from there where I'll be moderating Q & As with Supporting Actress contender Stephanie Hsu (Everything Everywhere All at Once) and Best Documentary Feature hopeful Goodnight Oppy as well as doing another "Coffee & Contenders" panel with Clayton & Jazz as is our annual habit! We'll also catch up with some other Oscar contenders there like The Whale.

In the meantime what's on your cinematic mind? Besides Cate Blanchett in TÁR, Triangle of Sadness, and Angela Lansbury (RIP) that is since there are other posts to discuss those! Also have you taken our recommendation to watch Catherine Called Birdy yet? 

And let's take another round of questions from you to get us talking again.

Almost There: Angela Lansbury in "Death on the Nile"

by Cláudio Alves

From Gaslight to Glass Onion, Angela Lansbury had one extraordinary career whose sheer grandeur is hard to overstate. For almost 80 years, she entertained people worldwide, be it on the stages of Broadway or on TV as Jessica Fletcher, from roles of unspeakable villainy to cherished nurturers in children's media. So to read news of her death was shocking, even though Lansbury was almost 97 – she passed less than a week before her birthday. It just seemed like she would live forever, a primordial force eternally present in our lives. Lansbury worked to the end, maintaining a last vestige of Old Hollywood alive with her. How can one come close to articulating what a loss this is for show business? There was simply no one else quite like Angela Lansbury.

To honor the star, let's recall one of her most colorful film creations, a foray into Agatha Christie's world of murder mysteries that almost nabbed Lansbury a fourth Oscar nomination – the 1978 Death on the Nile…

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Streaming Roulette (Oct 11th-16th): Tuneful agents, teenage ladies, and werewolves (by night)

by Nathaniel R

In the Streaming Roulette series we spotlight a few new-ish watches and freeze them randomly on the scroll bar. Whatever scene that comes up is the image we use.  Usually we mix it up in terms of services but this week Amazon Prime is hogging our conversation. Your streaming assignments for the week, should you choose to accept them... 

- Does he look like the Archangel Michael?
- No. No dead saint could be as beautiful as he.

CATHERINE CALLED BIRDY (2022) on Amazon Prime

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What did you see over the weekend?

By Ben Miller

For the second straight week, the story of the North American box office is about failure instead of success.  While horror film Smile captured the top spot for the second straight week, David O. Russell's star-studded Amsterdam managed only $6.4 million on a reported $80 budget. Many are blaming the poor reception from critics and audiences (33% on Rotten Tomatoes, a measly B CinemaScore), but this feels like Russell's indiscretions coming back to bite him.  Meanwhile, Lyle, Lyle Crocodile, the first kid-focused film released in months, made for a solid 2nd-place showing.  

Holiday Weekend Box Office (estimates... not every film has reported yet) October 7th-10th 🔺 = new or expanding /  ★ = Recommended links if we've written about it
WIDE (OVER 800 SCREENS)	LIMITED / PLATFORM
SMILE	TRIANGLE OF SADNESS

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The Fault in Our 'TÁR'

by Nathaniel R

Cate Blanchett as "TÁR" © Focus Features

The world famous conductor Lydia Tár is breathing strangely in the wings. As she inhales and exhales forcefully with tiny staccato bursts of her facial muscles, the image of a rock star hopping in place, self-hyping before their concert is conjured. Will Tár's elite audience devolve into a hysterical screaming teenager at the first sight of her?

Conductor as rock star? It's a rare and incredulous notion. Gone are the days of monoculture when a "Maestro" like Leonard Bernstein (emphatically name checked) could become a household name. But in Todd Field's TÁR we believe it, surely in part because one of the most famous movie stars in the world is playing her. In the year of our lord 2022, Cate Blanchett needs no introduction; Lydia Tár is a different story, and her introduction -- an exhausting recitation of her many diverse accomplishments as she turns 50 -- is a doozy...

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