August. It's a Wrap

Summer's end. Halleloo! I can practically taste the fall and it is delicious. Mmmmm dead leaves. Here are some key posts from the dog days of summer in case you missed them.

Cinema Swimwear The Film Experience launches a clothing line! Why didn't you purchase anything?
Short Term 12 How many films this good does August ever bring? Go see it!
The Worst of the Worst Tim looks back at 3 horrifying cinema summers 
The Last Temptation of Christ Michael wonders if it still has the power to outrage?

Skarsgård Reads Naked ...how the mind wanders
The Color Purple a look back through Oscar-tinted glasses for "Best Shot"
Team Hitchcock are these the 10 most memorable performances in his films? 
Podcasting The Butler the gang is all back and the podcasts are now weekly!  

COMING IN SEPTEMBER: It's Back to School Month so we'll be visiting some edumucational movies -- any suggestions? We'll be hitting new movies like The Family (La Pfeiffer), Don Jon (Scarjo & JGL), The Face of Love (The Bening!), and Prisoners (Viola, Hugh, and Jake? Yes please times three). Nathaniel and Amir will be reporting live from TIFF next week and Nathaniel, Jose, JA and Glenn will be reporting live from NYFF later in the month.

Finally, we had great fun in August "introducing" the characters from 1952's Supporting Actress lineup, revisiting the Oscar ceremony and then reviving Stinky Lulu's Smackdown. So next month 'The Year of the Month' (that has an odd ring to it, eh?) is 1980 so if you want to maximize your reading pleasure you'll rent Supporting Actress nominated films like Raging Bull, Private Benjamin, Melvin & Howard, Inside Moves, and Resurrection and maybe catch a few of the other seminal films from that year ... you know, for context.

I Love Good Silly.

I needed a really good laugh this week and Jean Hagen in Singin' in the Rain provided (again). Today apropos of nothing I thought of Chad Feldheimer (aka Brad Pitt) in Burn After Reading's overemphatic jogging/crying/phone-antics and started laughing. Silliness is so underrated in the movies... and in life.

When I was a child Cloris Leachman in The North Avenue Irregulars (1979) made me squeal with laughter - I had totally forgotten about that until she popped up in her own comic bubble in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid which we were just watching.

What's your favorite goofy thing in cinema with no pretense other than to have fun / be funny? I saw Mel Brooks Silent Movie for the first time a couple of years ago and was dying at Bernadette Peters' striptease... and at several other scenes, too. I was surprised because Mel Brooks doesn't always do it for me. For reliable laughs even if you've never heard of the movie, nothing beats 30s and 40s era screwball comedies in general or Carole Lombard specifically. I can't say that 80s comedies hold up all that well for me (Tootsie being a glorious exception) but I was thinking the other day that maybe 90s era comedy will last forever... so many genuinely hilarious movies that decade: Clueless, Waiting for Guffman, Bullets Over Broadway, Flirting with Disaster, Election!

Bernadette Peters in Silent Movie (1976)

Give us good rental suggestions to keep us giggling.

The First Televised Oscar Ceremony!

For today's daily nooner leadup to the Supporting Actress Smackdown of 1952 -- and to get us all pumped up for the burst of Fall Film Oscar Madness,  I thought we'd look at the Oscar ceremony itself and some really fun trivia. Ready?

Shirley Booth in NYC accepts her Oscar while the LA crowd looks on

• Did you know that the 1952 Oscars (held in March 1953) were the first televised Oscar ceremony ever? Now you do!  They were also bi-coastal (!!!) with Bob Hope entertaining in LA and the great Fredric March working the crowd in New York. 

• Shirley Booth, who won for Come Back Little Sheba, fell on the steps to the stage! You can watch it here. Jennifer Lawrence didn't invent that little attention grabbing Best Actress move this past February! MORE AFTER THE JUMP

Click to read more ...

What's the Most Embarrassing Thing You've Watched Recently?

You're only as sick as your secrets! I'll start...

I confess: I don't quite know how it happened -- maybe someone linked up purchasable mermaid tails on their facebook and one thing led to another? if so I blame them --  but somehow I watched 7 episodes of the Australian kids show Mako Mermaids this week. The acting is terrible (except for an baby Emma Stone type who is pretty good at physical comedy) and one thing happens every episode. ONE THING. Is that how kids shows are, plotwise?

YOUR TURN. What have you been watching that filled you with guilt? I mean you could've caught up on a classic or three you missed with those hours!