Links: Emmys, Normans, Books, Critics

Flavorwire has 20 film books for film lovers to own. Christmas list ideas?
Slant Kurt interviews the great Alison Janney who has a 'special knack for spurring films to life'
Arts Beat Adele records song for the new James Bond film Skyfall. Can't wait to hear it
Slate another perceptive review of Bachelorette
Deadline Adorable little Freddie Highmore (Finding Neverland) is no longer adorable. He's grown up to become a young Norman Bates in that Psycho prequel TV series "Bates Motel". 

HitFix interviews Chris Evans about his Captain America break, puking gym sessions, and the indie flick Iceman which just played at TIFF
IndieWire polled critics about the best films and performances at TIFF -- The Master nearly tops every poll its eligible for but fails to win "Most Disappointing" (edged out by To the Wonder)
The Advocate a new celebrity photographry book compiling Jack Robinson's 70s portraits. Clint Eastwood somehow looks like Hugh Jackman and Warren Beatty is all in leather
Playbill congrats to Leslye Headland again. Her play Assistance (about showbiz assistants) will be developed for a television series
Broadway Blog Cheyenne Jackson (yay!) to star in a new Broadway romantic comedy about adult film performers. Alicia Silverstone and Ari Graynor co-star!
MNPP attends a star-packed Q&A for 10 Years
Towleroad My latest column finds me blathering on about a handful of future Oscar players

Congratulations to Joshua Bergasse for his Best Choreography Win for "SMASH". It's the first time a TV series has claimed the prize in 17 years

Emmy Time - yes, I'll live blog on Sunday
Playbill Smash wins Joshua Bergasse an Emmy for Best Choreography for "Wolf" "National Pasttime" and The Film Experience's all-time favorite Smash number "Let's Be Bad". 
LA Times & Deadline HBO leads the Emmys so far with 17 wins including several for Game of Thrones. And, yes, Mad Men lost costume design AGAIN. It will go down as one of the great awards injustices that that series never wins costume design. Just shameful! Guest Acting Emmys: Kathy Bates (Two and Half Men), Martha Plimpton (The Good Wife), Jeremy Davies (Justified), and Jimmy Fallon (SNL)

Burning Questions: Repeat Viewing Discoveries

Michael C here. Now that Toronto has kicked the Fall movie season into high gear it’s useful to remember that for most of these films February’s impending Oscar ceremony is the beginning of the story, not the end. An Academy Award is a great leg up when it comes to securing a film’s legacy, even if it’s only as a footnote, but the real test of a film’s shelf life will be its ability to stand up to the gauntlet of repeat viewings. The test of time is much more accurate measure of a film’s worth than awards season's five month carnival of hype.

You only need to look back to recent movie history to see how the years can build up some films while grinding others down without mercy. I cannot recall the last time I’ve read a film lover reference a great scene from former big event films like Babel or The Queen. Yet the reputations of other less celebrated films from that time period like Eastern Promises or Let the Right One In grow with every passing year.

So this leads me to the question I’m curious to have answered:

Which recent films are coming alive on repeat viewings?

I’m not talking here about complicated films which reward repeat viewings. Yes, dense films like Gosford Park and LA Confidential play better with a foreknowledge of the story, but their quality was clear even when lost in the weeds of the initial viewing. No, I’m talking about films that hit us as average or even so-so the first time around but which linger in the memory and nag at us and then – BAM – sucker punch us with their previously unseen strength when revisited.

This happened to me recently when I was struck to realize that I had watched the Coen brother’s True Grit no less than half a dozen times. I had a positive, if somewhat underwhelmed, reaction to the western in theaters. It was the usual A+ stylistic Coen brothers job, but hit me as an unusually straightforward genre exercise from them. I wouldn’t have even bothered to picked up the DVD if not for the fact that my parents wanted to see it and the only way to get them to watch a movie is to personally interrupt an episode of NCIS with it.

Once I owned it I was surprised to find True Grit become my go-to feature. I now understand that the Coens did with True Grit what Tarantino did with Jackie Brown. Tarantino says he wanted Jackie Brown to be a hangout movie. The sort of film you watch first for the plot but return to for the downtime between the big moments, just to spend time with the characters. I realized that on repeat trips to Grit I wasn’t looking forward to the big set pieces as much as I was anticipating the odd little encounters like the unexpected run in with a bearskin clad backwoods doctor who wants to bargain for the teeth from a corpse Mattie cut down from a tree. Or the way the film's main heavy, Barry Pepper’s Lucky Ned, turns out to be unexpectedly reasonable when they finally catch up to him. (Admittedly it also helps to know in advance everything Bridges is saying) I suppose I should have known better than to trust my snap judgment when it came to the Coens, whose Big Lebowski is one of the great repeat viewing success stories of the last twenty years. I suppose it’s time I gave Burn After Reading another spin.

Have any of you had any recent repeat viewing discoveries? Do you see a consensus emerging around any titles that flew under the radar in theaters? Let me know in the comments.

Follow Michael C. on Twitter at @SeriousFilm. And read his blog Serious Film.

TIFF: Oscar Talking Points and Personal Favourites

Amir here, wrapping up my coverage of the Toronto International Film Festival.

I have to apologize for my absence yesterday on TIFF's closing weekend. A broken laptop charger prevented me any access to the internet. As you already know, David O. Russell's Silver Linings Playbook snatched the coveted People's Choice Award. In keeping with my tradition of not watching films with set public release dates at the festival, I passed on the film in my original planning. And yesterday, when people lined up for the film’s honorary additional screening, I was in a different theatre watching my favourite actress Julianne Moore playing a rock star in What Maisie Knew. 

More including Oscar buzz and a Festival jury of one after the jump...

Click to read more ...

Sick In the City 2

I guess spending all day at the beach in ice cold water and bright sunlight after months of shut-in city dwelling is maybe not the best move? I'm totally sick today hence the lack of posting. I have a fever and I do nothing but sleep and watch bad television. [Cue violins]

This is how sick I am: When Sex and the City 2 came on cable earlier, I didn't even have enough energy to reach for the remote and the horror washed all over me again. Good Christ but that movie is atrocious. So much worse than I remember it being!

What's the worst movie you've subjected yourself to recently or again... and what's your excuse?

"Silver Linings" Wins TIFF. Here's What It Means Statistically For Oscar.

The Toronto International Film Festival wraps up today (movies are still being projected, though, even as I type) and the awards are out. Silver Linings Playbook took the Audience Prize, which is usually a good sign for Oscar. 10 of the 34 past winners have gone on to Best Picture nominations with 4 eventually winning the top prize (The King's Speech, Slumdog Millionaire, American Beauty and Chariots of Fire). That group of 34 films also includes 1 Best Documentary Oscar winner and 9 Best Foreign Language Film nominees (5 of them eventual winners.)  It's not fail safe of course. Last year's winner Where Do We Go Now? looked strong for Oscar foreign play but wasn't nominated and the previous winner's list includes various sixth-slotters like Amélie and Hotel Rwanda which didn't quite make their respective Best Picture lineups. But to make this long story much shorter this is the silver lining for Silver Linings come December; expect big golden things.

Other Winners...

Canadian Feature: Xavier Dolan's transsexual drama Laurence Anyways starring Melvil Poupad.
Canadian Directorial Debut: [TIE] Brandon Cronenberg's (Son Of David!) body horror drama Antiviral and Jason Buxton's teen violence drama Blackbird two chillers from up north.
Canadian Short: Keep a Modest Head by Deco Dawson

Brandon Cronenberg's debut features Sarah Gadon, his dad's current muse (A Dangerous Method / Cosmopolis).

FIPRESCI Prize Special Presentation: François Ozon's In the House which stars Kristin Scott Thomas as the wife of a French teacher (Fabrice Luchini) whose gifted teenage student is writing too intimately about the people in his life.
FIPRESCI Prize Discovery: Mikael Marsiman's Call Girl is based on the true story of a 1970s prostitution ring in Sweden.
Audience Award Documentary: Artifact finds Jared Leto's band "30 Seconds To Mars" battling their record label. More on this one soon.
Audience Award Midnight Madness: Seven Psychopaths from the singular comic talent Martin McDonagh
Asian Film: Sion Sono's Japanese tsunami survival drama The Land of Hope 

THE LAND OF HOPE (The Impossible isn't the only tsunami drama out there)

TIFF hits that lost out included Sarah Polley's reportedly bewitching Stories We Tell and the two runners up to the big People's Choice prize: Ben Affleck's Argo (of which you're already as familiar as you can be without seeing the damn thing) and Eran Riklis' Zaytoun which is a war drama about an Israel fighter pilot (Stephen Dorff) shot down over Lebanon.

TIFF devotee we appreciate most: Amir. 

TIFF virgin we're crazy jealous of: Nick. 

TIFF fringe dweller who never even made it to Canada: Nathaniel... [sniffle]

For what it's worth expect much more festival coverage for NYFF (coming very soon). Michael Cusumano and I will both hit the fest and share our reactions right here.