True Blood 4.10 "Burning Down The House"

when you came in the air went out and every shadow filled up with doubt ♫  I think I'll miss the theme song most of all when True Blood goes bye-bye in a couple of weeks. We're nearly at the end of Season 4. You can tell because things get crazy crazier craziest craziestest (where we are now) before the wrap. Finales have a way of bringing most of the characters back together where they should be. Quoth Tara when Sookie, Jason, Lafayette and Jesus arrive at the Moon Goddess Emporium where ⅘ of the cast is by the time the credits roll...

Reinforcements!"

They've arrived to save Tara and assorted humans from being blown to smithereens when the vamps arrive to take out Marnie once and for all. But I've jumped ahead since we're doing this wrap up quickest-like.

"Burning Down The House"
The episode begins with an assassination attempt at the Dorchester, as possessed Eric and King Bill fight it out until Sookie finally intervenes with her fairy powers, saving Bill from death and accidentally curing Eric's amnesia. Nan confronts Bill about it later with the very sensible question:

What's the deal with your little dairymaid and her lightning trick?

Since Bill doesn't answer her, I will.

You see Nan it's like this. Sookie's powers are now True Blood shorthand for "We've written ourselves into a corner and plus we can't kill off the main characters so here is a blast of fairy dust power which Sookie doesn't understand and which we don't either but it sure helps us to advance the plotline!"  Done!

With Marnie/Antonia's assassination of Bill foiled, Nan and Bill go to war over what to do next "Bill. Image!" Nan reminds him and the glamouring of the town begins so that they'll forget all the bloodshed; what happens at the Dorchester stays at the Dorchester!

FORGETTING. We soon realize that dead necromancer Antonia who was possessing Marnie doesn't want to remember the bloodshed either. ZOMG, it's Marnie who is now running the show!!! Jason, as it turns out, would also like to forget the previous episodes fucking/fighting mess . Jessica doesn't appreciate his request to be glamoured, continuing her delicious character arc in Season 4 to embrace her inner vampire. "Fucking humans. I'm going to go find somebody to eat."

Feel Her Vibrations!

In other important developments: Sookie still loves Billzzzzz and Eric isn't happy aboutzzzzz; Terry stages an intervention to help Andy with his V addiction; Holly the witch (Lauren Bowles) continues to be a great addition to the cast and convinces Tara to trust her own fury - "There aint no spell that can't be undone if you got the juice" -- and lord knows Tara is overflowing with fury juice!; Tommy dies from internal bleeding (or too much skin walking?) which sets Sam and Alcides on a vengeance spiral against wolf-pack leader Marcus who is now hitting on Alcides ladyfriend (though no one knows this yet); 

But most of all Episode 10 is about Fiona Shaw's awesomeness and her delicious vocal control -- weird Spanish accent aside -- in displaying all those internal psychotic breaks and shifts from Marnie to Antonia. She's continuing the slow morphing from meek dim Marnie to superior why-do-people-question-my-awesomeness Marnie? Which results in all sorts of great line readings like the self righteous/needy "I have put my soul at risk to destroy the night beasts for you" and the delightfully boasty "We've got our very own vampires in the ladies room!" and the grinning madness "Have you ever seen me so happy?"... well, yes Fiona, like that time you were an even bigger loon in Black Dahlia; That Cheshire grin is scarier than any Jack-o-Lantern that's every come before. 

Line Reading Hall of Fame

Fate brought us together to fight evil. Did you really think no one was going to get hurt?

At episode's end Jesus has broached Marnie's protection spell, but not her dark heart and he's relayed the new sit'ch back to the other reinforcements. Marnie is the Big Bad, not Antonia the dead ghost possessing her. But then Marnie suddenly teleports everyone ... where? Cue the vampires arriving to blow shit up. Cue: credits.  

Body Count: 1 nameless vampire and 1 skinwalker (Goodbye Tommy! Goodbye rich comic opportunities for other actors to pretend to be him pretending to be them. Sniffle); Sex Scenes: 0 (what!?!); Best Sookie Moment: "I never promised that." Anna Paquin is good with the hard honesty and cleft heart; Funniest Moment: Nan's inner 5 year old tyrant comes out, every vampire pissing her off. "True Death for you, too!"; Episode MVP: Marnie; Episode Grade: B+

Previously on True Blood
4.1 "She's Not There"  MVP: Marnie; Grade: C
4.2 "You Smell Like Dinner"  MVP: Eric; Grade: A
4.3 "If You Love Me Why...?"  MVP: Eric; Grade: B+
4.4 "I'm Alive and On Fire"  MVP: Sookie; Grade: B+
4.5 "Me and the Devil"   MVP: Arlene; Grade: A-
4.6 "I Wish I Was the Moon"  MVP: Pam; Grade: B
4.7 "Cold Grey Light..."   MVP: Jessica; Grade: B- 
4.8 "Spellbound" MVP: The Fortenberrys (Hoyt & Maxine); Grade: B+ 
4.9 "Let's Get Out of Here" MVP: Sam; Grade: B 

Shanghai Surprise?

Last night while Lady Gaga was living through an entire MTV VMA evening as "Jo Calderone" her male alter ego, I began to wonder if she could ever transfer to the big screen? In the past I'd always dismissed the notion but I think she pulled off that bit of theater last night. At the very least she sure is committed. And doesn't it seem that every major pop star eventually tries the silver screen. Britney Spears, who was also honored last night, did. Remember Crossroads? She didn't. For every Cher or Justin Timberlake who make a real honest go of it, there are dozens and dozens of musicians that fail at it or do okay but move on any way and their efforts are, generally speaking, quickly forgotten.

Which got me to thinking about Shanghai Surprise, which opened 25 years ago on this very day. No joke!

Madonna and Sean Penn, the early years

...though many thought the movie was.

Shanghai Surprise was Sean Penn and Madonna's first and last film together and it premiered just a year after the media explosion that was their wedding and subsequent volatile marriage. I haven't seen Shanghai Surprise since the 80s and the only thing I remembered about it before I took a wee peek today was that Madonna played a missionary who at one point just stripped into a white slip and seduced Sean Penn.

As missionaries do.

The reason Madonna was never much of an actress is that she was always too aware of the camera. It's a bit of an irony, since great film acting is all about an actor's relationship with the camera, but they really can't show that they're aware of it unless they're wildly talented and doing so on purpose. Otherwise, the audience just gets uncomfortable. 

God Nathaniel, why are you reminding people of a rare failure?!

Still, for all of Shanghai Surprise's badness, whenever two colossal careers meet in some disastrous way that's recorded for posterity, it's kind of fun to witness / remember. Take the moment Madonna first sees Sean Penn above. She is prim and proper and he is a totally drunk, half naked man who's screaming at people in Chinese.

Madonna's only had a couple of lines before this, all of them entirely wooden. But when she stares at him in disgust and confusion, it's hard not to feel a bit sympathy as soon as you are also staring at him. Penn was already, by 1986, an acclaimed and wildly confident actor.  

And he's ACTING enough for both of them, trust.

Look at that. [Displaying tattoo] He didn't even finish the nipples on my little sweetheart!"

Have you ever seen Shanghai Surprise? Do you ever think about which pop stars could make it as actors?

Throw Some Rice, Share Some Link

Before we begin today's news roundup, we must throw some rice. From The Godfather we know that the Coppola's can throw a hell of a wedding. Wish the newlyweds well: Mrs and Mrs Sofia Coppola / Thomas Mars.

The Film Doctor on Luc Besson's Colombiana
The Wrap Pedro Almodóvar will guest direct the AFI Fest and present a 25th anniversary screening of Law of Desire (which is only Nathaniel's favorite Almodóvar, don'cha know) 
IndieWire 10 things that festival season will tell us 'bout the awards race 
Twitch Film has the trailer to the new Hrithik Roshan epic: color, musical numbers, tons of violence. Bollywood always goes all out. 

And no, I'm not sharing The Hunger Games teaser which you can see on roughly 93% of all blogs on the internet today. Someone's gotta take a stand for their .0000000000001% of the film blogging world! Basically Jennifer Lawrence runs through a forest while we learn in narration that she's good at hunting. Then she fires an arrow at the logo. That's it. Search for it yourself if you're a slave to movie marketing. Seriously, that movie: Calm down! I've never felt this exhausted by a movie trying to become an event before. It will probably work which is why movies spend so much on P&A but wouldn't it be cool if audiences got to decide which films were events AFTER SEEING THEM. 

just for fun
The New Yorker "I'm Sorry" by Paul Rudnick
Michael Musto on the VMA Tribute to Britney Spears 
YouTube Hurricane Irene brings back streaking. nsfw
Playbill OMG Carol Channing is releasing a new album at 90 years young this winter. Go see Carol Channing: Larger than Life, a new documentary, if you get a chance. It's fun. 

Ask Nathaniel...

You know the drill now, right? Throw me a question -- avoid multi-part questions or top ten lists or anything that would require a huge ass post all by itself to answer -- and I'll pick a couple of handfuls of them to answer in tomorrow's Q&A column.

"A Star is Born"... or, will be *after* the Star's baby is born.

Beyoncé announced her pregnancy at MTV's VMAs last night. I switched channels after Gaga's drag king opening number so the news got to me secondhand.

There be film fallout. The fourth feature film version of A Star is Born (2013? 2014?) is now delayed for at least nine months as Beyoncé gestates and welcomes her first child into the world. The musical, meant to be Clint Eastwood's post J Edgar project, had hoped to go before the cameras early in 2012 and with the speed that Eastwood tends to work we would have probably seen it as a Christmas 2012 release.

But now that Beyoncé is pregnant (and considering also that Leonardo DiCaprio has turned down the male lead role), this won't be happening just yet. The Beyoncé/Jay-Z babe will be born first.

Oscar-obsessives should keep a close eye on this one -- the film, not the babe. While the project seems ridiculous on the surface for both "another one?" superfluity and Eastwood + Beyoncé odd-coupledom, A Star is Born is a durable cultural object. It's always a major morphing showcase for the gifts of its leading lady. The first three incarnations resulted in 17 Oscar nominations and 3 Oscars all told including bids for Best Actress for both Janet Gaynor (1937) and Judy Garland (1954) and a Best Original Song Oscar for Barbra Streisand's "Evergreen" (1976).

Will we see Beyoncé as a Best Actress nominee in 2013 or 2014... or will she have to "settle" for a Best Song Oscar?