Almost There: Margot Robbie in "Mary, Queen of Scots"

by Cláudio Alves

Since her 2013 breakthrough in The Wolf of Wall Street, Margot Robbie's Hollywood career has risen so consistently and quickly that its verging on meteoric. Early stabs at blockbuster stardom paid off with her über-popular Harley Quinn, soon giving way to more prestigious pursuits. I, Tonya earned the Australian actress her first Oscar nomination, and a second soon followed for Bombshell. This year, beyond dominating social media while location shooting for Greta Gerwig's upcoming Barbie, Robbie returns with two big movies. First up is David O. Russell's Amsterdam which opens Friday under a wave of controversy and critical scorn. Then, on Christmas Day, Damien Chazelle's Babylon finds her playing a Clara Bow-type in one of the year's buzziest titles.

As we wait to see if Robbie ends the season as a three-time Oscar nominee, let's turn our minds back to when the thespian tried her hand at playing one of the most dramatized figures in film history – Elizabeth I in Mary, Queen of Scots…

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Streaming Roulette (Oct 3rd-9th): Call Me By Your Queerest Fear

by Nathaniel R

The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945) © MGM

Each of us has heaven and hell in him.

As many of you have gleaned your host here has been struggling this past month. So as ever we take solace in the movies and we've been gorging of late so time for another streaming catch-up. We've realized of late that in attempting to do too many things here at TFE -- we are after all not Variety or The New York Times --  we do too little. So we have to streamline / simplify. Our first victim is Streaming Roulette. Rather than a monthly series in which we try to highlight EVERYTHING that's new to streaming on all the services, we're going to recommend a handful of titles weekly just for an excuse to talk about them. We'll keep the "roulette" part which is to say we'll freeze frame randomly on the scroll bar and that's the image we'll share as visual (What? We like our gimmicks). 

4 Things to Watch This Week...

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Deadline is up for Oscar's Best International Film submissions

by Nathaniel R

KINGS OF THE WORLD, Colombia's Oscar submission

Today, October 3rd, is the deadline for participating countries to get their Oscar submissions in for the Best International Feature Film category. We've mentioned before that the Academy (wrongly) chucked their longstanding tradition of publicly announcing the entire longlist for Best International Feature Film last season... if they don't release it again this year we might not know for certain for a few days or even a few weeks what is exactly on the list they're considering in the first round of voting. They'll narrow the list down to 15 films on December 21st, 2022 and then announce the actual nominations on January 24th, 2023.  As of now we know of 81 countries that announced plans to submit a particular film and you can read about all of them on the charts. 

If you've been playing along here with each article a shorter list of the last six films to be announced is after the jump...

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Podcast Guesting: On 'Bros' and Fantasy Oscar Drafts

by Nathaniel R

I recently had the pleasure of guesting on two podcasts. The first was the annual fantasy draft episode of Oscar Wild wherein various pundits/Oscar fans chose our horses for the Oscar season. You'll recognize a lot of the lovely voices. It was fun which was expected but also extremely tense which was a surprise -- I drew the shortest straw so I was the last to choose a contender but the draft was in a snake order so thankfully it all sort of evened out. The episode was recorded BEFORE the festival premieres so some of the choices are already ouchies given the mixed/negative reception of a few of the films. I'm pretty happy about betting on Top Gun Maverick, Triangle of Sadness, and Elvis among others. The rest, we shall see. 

Then this weekend in a change of pace I was the guest for a bonus episode of Hallmarkies, a podcast about romantic comedies with a focus on Hallmark movies. Since frequent Hallmark leading man Luke Macfarlane is the romantic co-lead of Billy Eichner's Bros, it was a natural topic for them to hit.

I really really loved Bros (even more than Baby Clyde did) and, though I wish I'd been a bit more eloquent in singing its praises, I hope you enjoy both the movie and this podcast. If you haven't seen the movie yet, I would suggest waiting until you do to listen to this since we talk about the plot in full and you'll want to save the surprises and great laugh lines for the moviegoing experience! 

ICYMI - Best of August/September

We realize the site has been eerily quiet this past month. But as we meet backstage to rectify, here are a dozen highlights you might have missed these past two months...

A dozen highlights
• Michelle Williams' Ocar campaign Nathaniel on the pundit freakout of her lead campaign
• Emmys in Review Nathaniel shares highlights from TV's big night
• Don't Worry Darling Glenn reviewed the film that's on everyone's lips albeit for the wrong reasons
• Smackdown 1997 Special guests have a lively discussion on Julianne Moore, Joan Cusack, Kim Basinger and more to celebrate a great Oscar year
• Almost There Cláudio revisited James Dean's iconic work in Rebel Without a Cause
• Ranking: Joanne & Paul to honor "The Last Movie Stars" limited series, Cláudio watched all of the Newman & Woodward collaborations
• Goddamn Asura Juan Carlos interviews the director of Taiwan's Oscar submission
• Film Critic & The Common Man Ben shares what he learned launching a podcast with his brother
• First Look - Babylon Thoughts Nathaniel had on the first official images
• TIFF Baby Clyde, Matt, and Abe reviewed new films
• Venice Elisa attended, Cláudio reviewed past winners, and Nathaniel gawked at fashion
• Palme d'Or title switcheroos an international amusement

Coming in October. We're going to be careful about promising too much given the past two months but we will 100% be attending the NYFF (already in progress) and Middleburg festivals to discuss hot Oscar titles as well as exciting world cinema offerings. The 1951 Smackdown (already recorded) will also go up soon. And we will try to find time for some spooky treats for Halloween, too. Stay tuned.