You're Gonna Need a Bigger Link

Super Cafe Batman and Supes argue about the title of their upcoming duo movie (Batman's voice is perfect)
Pajiba 25 celebrities you didn't realize were related by marriage 
Angry Nerd has Pixar's number with the brand debasing. NO PREQUELS
Empire Director Zhang Yimou may helm the umpteenth remake of The Hunchback of Notre Dame with Josh Brolin as Quasimodo. I'll only be satisified if Brolin sings "Out There"
Guardian looks at Nollywood (Nigerian cinema) and its depiction of LGBT people
Cinema Blend Sarah Michelle Gellar on a possible movie version of Buffy the Vampire Slayer (and, essentially, why there won't be one) 

MNPP "we three films of disorient argh" wins my vote for best blogpost title of the month and it's only August 1st! JA pontificates on The Grandmaster, Blue Jasmine, and The Call
Tim Brayton thinks its been a rough summer at the movies and in this August preview it's not looking any better
i09 Frankenstein poster sets new record for movie poster at auction
TV Blend Rob Lowe and Rashida Jones are leaving Parks & Recreation. Time to wrap it up, Pawnee. The 6th season is usually when great television starts a downward slide to ungood anyway. (See: too many examples to mention)
Coming Soon Aaron Taylor Johnson talks Quicksilver. He wants the part in The Avengers: The Age of Ultron 

Today's Watch

Our favorite couple of yesteryear filmmaker/genius Paul Thomas Anderson (The Master, Boogie Nights) and musician/genius Fiona Apple have reunited for this music video "Hot Knife". This is my favorite track on her latest "Idler Wheel" and I'm happy it brought them together again... at least for an afternoon to shoot this. Maya Rudolph is cool with it I'm sure. 

Coda
Finally, as follow up to Michael's piece about the Broken Blockbuster culture in Hollywood, /Film is warning us that the enormous grosses for Despicable Me 2 have convinced Universal that their all franchise all the time credo is the right choice. But mostly I want to suggest that you read this piece in The New York Times Magazine about Jaws (1975).

...from that point forward, the tiniest splash of a minnow could set the audience shrieking.

This is really what “Jaws” was about: Not sharks, but fear. Not action, but suspense. That’s what made it possible for the story of a single shark to scare millions of people into avoiding 71 percent of the earth’s surface.

They're right, you know. We really should stop blaming that excellent character-driven film for the terribleness of today's disappointing character-free blockbusters... even if it did make Hollywood obsessed with gobbling big profits each summer.

Should There Be An Oscar For Best Casting?

Yesterday I thought about casting director Juliet Taylor probably more than anyone on the planet who isn't Juliet Taylor. When her name came up on the screen in Woody Allen's trademark font during Blue Jasmine I smiled -- I love that font and those familiar names so much. I recalled that she'd narrowly missed our top ten for "Women Who Deserve an Honorary Oscar", winning the most votes for anyone not in the writing/directing/acting/producing fields. Her resume is astounding featuring the massive Woody Allen filmography and non Woody films as famous as The Exorcist, Taxi Driver, Terms of Endearment, The Stepford Wives and Interview with the Vampire (so you can probably thank her for Kirsten Dunst). We made that list in the hopes that someone with pull in the Academy would read it and think 'huh. These are great ideas to course correct!'

Woody Allen's infamous reputation as a silent director of actors extends into casting where his auditions are notoriously short... sometimes just a meet and greet is all you get. So you know Juliet Taylor works long hours before and after Woody says "yea" or "nay". So there I was thinking about her, wondering about how many decisions she's making on her own when the Academy announced that they were adding another new branch to their ranks, Casting Directors. People are already speculating about whether this means a Best Casting Oscar will be added to the annual horse race for gold.

poll by twiigs.com

My heart and mind war on this topic all the time. My heart knows that casting directors are crucial to a film's success and would warm to them being recognized -- it's obviously the single most important element of filmmaking that doesn't have a category. My mind, on the other hand, isn't sure this is a good idea. My mind knows that people would win the Oscars for the wrong reasons... even wronger [sic] reasons than people win other Oscars for in other categories! I'd argue that casting directors would win for which Movie Stars and Films were favored in any given year rather than their hard work filling the screen with less glitzy faces. I don't work in the film industry but I'd argue that Directors, Agents, Movie Stars, and Lawyers and Studio Heads signing off on budgets are the ones who decide which Movie Star is paired with which project -- especially since movie stars are often in place before the casting director is -- and that the casting director's brilliance is filling out the names in the below the title list, predicting the intangibles of chemistry and guiding the director to the right decisions about who goes best with whom. It's world building actually... the world of faces.

Rich DeliaI imagine Best Casting would nearly always line up with Best Ensemble at SAG and come to mean "Starriest Cast That Is Also Our Vote For Best Picture" which is quite reductive. Do you imagine the same?

If you had to vote on Best Casting for 2013 right now, what would you pick? Without contest I'd name Short Term 12 the winner for 2013 (thus far) which mixes the awesome Brie Larson with Tony winner John Gallagher Jr (currently on The Newsroom on HBO) and a large supporting cast of wonderful unknown child and teenage actors. So congratulations to  Rich Delia for winning my non-existent prize for this year! He only recently graduated to lead Casting Director (He also did Dallas Buyers Club this year) but he's been very busy for the past few years as a Casting Associate on dozens of movies including The Help and August: Osage County.

July. It's a Wrap.

Despite the absolutely sweltering heat in July this summer in New York City I've survived to see another month. It's a miracle. The blog is Made in Air Conditioning. So let's book back on the monthwith highlights in case you melted through them. 

Personalize Your DVD Collection - Meet Nick's guest room
Women Who Deserve an Honorary Oscar - Team Experience gives AMPAS some suggestions since they invariably choose men for the honor
Shot in Chicago - Tim selects the movies that best represent the Windy City 
Cory Monteith (RIP) - Glee loses one of its originals
Goodbye Bunheads - Andrew eulogizes the unique ballet charmer, gone from the TV landscape too soon 

The Halfway Mark - best of the year January to June
Cinematic Swimwear - TFE launches its first clothing line. Which swimsuit did you buy?
Posterized: Almodóvar - His 19 films. How many have you seen?
Natalie on 34th Street - Tim remembers one of the all time great child performances 
A Jolly Holiday with Mary Poppins -best shots from Disney magical nanny masterwork

COMING IN AUGUST
Short Term 12, Blue Jasmine, The Spectacular Now, Alfred Hitchcock listing, more swimwear (any requests?), back to school goodies, the return of the Supporting Actress Smackdown via 1952 and oldies but goodies like: Shadow of a Doubt, The Color Purple, Singin' in the Rain, The Bad and the Beautiful, and more.

Burning Questions: Is the Summer Blockbuster Broken?

Michael C. here to sift through the Doomsday warnings that the Summer box office has provoked. How fitting is it that the story of this Summer’s box office is beginning to resemble one of the disaster movies Hollywood so loves to foist on audiences? 

Seldom does a Summer go by without a high profile flop or two, but these days we can’t get through a weekend without some mega-budget Summer tent-pole crashing and burning. R.I.P.D., White House Down, Lone Ranger, Turbo. One bomb after another. Slate dubbed it the Summer of the Mega-Flop, while the AV Club simply asked “Are Movies Doomed?” These are intelligent, well reasoned articles but in disaster movie terms they are the equivalent of the crackpot scientists prophesying Armageddon, warning everyone to “Look to the heavens! It’s an extinction level event!”

Many blame the crowded media landscape vying for consumer attention. Others point to the recession limiting the disposable cash in consumer pockets. The overall crappiness of the movies themselves hasn’t gone unnoticed either (out of the many underperformers I’d say only Pacific Rim doesn’t richly deserve its fate). The truth involves some mix of all of these factors, but I think the main problem may lay somewhere deeper. I ask you, Is Hollywood’s blockbuster formula fundamentally broken? 

Click to read more ...

Hitchcock & Oprah on 'Hit Me With Your Best Shot'

Three great (?) movies by three renowned directors (Alfred Hitchcock, Steven Spielberg and Vincente Minnelli) are next on Hit Me With Your Best Shot

We didn't mean to take two weeks off (whoops) but here we go again. If you've never participated please consider joining. It's easy and fun and gives you an excuse to watch a classic again or for the first time. On Wednesday nights we look at a famous (or interesting) movie and we each select "the best shot", completely subjective of course, from the film. Tell us why you chose it and we link up. It's communal movie fun!

Wed Aug 7th SHADOW OF A DOUBT (1943)
It doesn't have the highest profile among Hitchcock's classics so let's boost that up a bit since the Master himself was so fond of it among his own movies and Stoker, now on DVD, riffs on it so shamelessly.
[108 minutes, 1 Oscar nomination. Available on Amazon Instant]

Wed Aug 14th THE COLOR PURPLE (1985)
Let's celebrate the return of Oprah Winfrey to the big screen (in Lee Daniel's The Butler) with a look back at this beloved 80s film. I haven't seen it since the 80s and other people adore it so much more than I that I thought now was the time to give it another chance.
[154 minutes, 11 Oscar nominations]

Wed Aug 21st  THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL (1952) winner of 5 Oscars including Cinematography. We're watching it for the return of the Supporting Actress Smackdown on August 28th and plus, Nathaniel (c'est moi) loves Vincent Minnelli movies. Yes, the Smackdown is coming back.
[118 minutes, 6 Oscar nominations.]

After The Bad and the Beautiful we'll wrap up this Best Shot season with one or two more pictures depending on how many of you are participating and where the excitement level is. What should we close with? Let's do a boy appeal movie since I'm often choosing women's pictures. I can't help myself!