Top Ten: Song Titles That Should Be Movies
Tuesday, September 4, 2012 at 11:57PM This week's top ten list is dedicated to James T, one of my fav readers and twitterers, who asked me some time ago to "pick song titles that you'd have liked to be the titles of movies that should exist." I couldn't resist the odd wildly random challenge and given that I recently hosted a karaoke party (don't ask) I'm in the mood. So here goes...This list was actually hard to make because so many songs -- even great ones -- have totally generic titles.
TEN SONGS TITLES THAT I TOTALLY WISH WERE MOVIES
Next year can we have Fiona Apple title all the movies that come out?
Runners up: ""Extraordinary Machine, Hot Knife" or any of her album titles -Fiona Apple... and can we talk her into trying acting?, "Please Don't Make Me Too Happy" - Christine Lavin, "Backwoods Barbie" - Dolly Parton cuz she loves to write about herself so why not a fun biopic?
10 "Do You Wanna Funk" -Sylvester
And can it be a serious yet fun movie about discos and clubbing in the 1970s? 54 was so lame.
09 "Call Me Maybe" - Carly Rae Jepsen
But only if it's a romantic comedy that comes out in 2013 (like, Girls Just Wanna Have Fun would be a stupid title for a movie now but it was just right back in 1985!) . And yes I sang this at karaoke. Don't judge.
Rihanna Wants Elvira
Tuesday, September 4, 2012 at 9:17PM Has anyone yet compiled a list of every 80s film that's been remade? It would be long and exhausting and this decade would already be lousing with them. Scarface (1983), like many of the films already remade, is quintessentially 80s but that won't stop Hollywood from going there. Word is that Rihanna is desperate to play Elvira Hancock (the role which was the first real sign that Michelle Pfeiffer was one for the pantheon) should the remake actually go forward.
Rihanna is a member of Scarface's legion of fans
I shouldn't judge Rihanna's acting ability without seeing Battleship (uh...) but her music video work doesn't give me much faith in her as an actress per se. I've always thought her face was unusually inexpressive actually (Not that I'm a Rihanna expert). The thing that really got me LOLin'g about the gossipy news item which originated in The Sun is this:
”Rihanna loves ‘Scarface...Some of her music videos have been based on Michelle’s character, Elvira. She knows all the words and even has her walk perfected.”
I'm not sure knowing all the words counts as a plus in acting before a screenplay's been written!
But I do agree with Rihanna that Elvira has "ridiculous swagger". Given that superiority complex, I'm reasonally certain that Elvira herself wouldn't take kindly to anyone's desire to recreate her. Quoth Elvira:
Don't toot your own horn, honey. You're not that good."
Michelle Pfeiffer, Rihanna, Scarface, remakes Take Three: Samantha Morton
Tuesday, September 4, 2012 at 3:33PM Craig here with the penultimate ‘Take Three’. This week: Samantha Morton...
The Artists are present: Samantha Morton (and Marina Abramovic) doing jury duty in Venice right now
She's currently advising R-Pattz in Cronenberg’s Cosmopolis on screen and serving as a jury member on the 69th Venice Film Festival off screen.
Take One: Under the Skin (1997)
After some acclaimed TV and short film work, Morton made her feature bow in Carine Adler’s Under the Skin. In it she plays Iris, a girl selfdestructing and suffering due to the death of her mother. In this blistering debut Morton flits between girlish abandon and hot-tempered wilfulness. At times the camera has trouble keeping up with her as she weaves through life picking up numerous sexual conquests in retaliation for not being able to confront her grief. Other times, the camera can’t seem to pull away from its close focus on Morton’s expressive face, as in the scene where she enters a church and tearfully gazes at the congregation.
Iris’s spiralling descent into sexual oblivion is every bit as bruising and obsessive as, say, Michael Fassbender’s Shame odyssey – but from a far more adult viewpoint. (Whatever Fassbender’s Brandon did, he never had a guy piss on him for empty thrills – something Iris experiences here.) Iris vainly makes herself over by donning her dead mother’s clothes, wigs and makeup in an attempt to ‘become’ her in order to keep the memory close. Morton subtly alters Iris’ actions by veering between this maternal imitation and the fractured shell of a girl she really is. Authenticity is paramount to Morton and she shrewdly maintains a delicate balance between sexually assertive and introverted that never once feels contrived or tied up in actorly affectation. She's been a risk taker and has kept it real from day one.
Morton putting on a different face in "Under the Skin"
Control, Samantha Morton, Take Three, The Messenger, Under the Skin V/H/S, or The Concept of a Woman
Tuesday, September 4, 2012 at 1:00PM 
Hi, loves! Beau here, having just caught the new horror compilation V/H/S on VOD, and spent the night ruminating on a few different elements that the film(s) brought to light for me.
V/H/S is a horror film that for me, is a game changer. And not in a good way. Were you to pull a gun to my head and ask me what genre captures my heart and my imagination more than any other, I’d say horror. It’s my Achilles heel, bloody and severed. The pulse quickens and the imagination runs rampant. You’re not limited to set tonal shifts but atypical ones. You can go anywhere in horror. And what V/H/S left me with is the sense that if we’re willing to venture into this stylized vein of storytelling, why aren’t we taking more risks inside of it? Pandora’s box is a large one, loves. She likes it that way. A girl needs a big purse.
Deliverance, Found-Footage, Horror, Joe Swanberg, Ti West, V/H/S, VOD, iTunes