20:20 (Pt 3) Mind games, mood pieces, and Spanish winners

Since the year will soon wind to a close we're surveying the films of 2020 here and there -- terrific, terrible, and anywhere in between -- based on what's available to stream by freezing them at the 20th minute and 20th second. (Though please note that some services' time stamps make this difficult to get exactly right). What comes up? That's the fun of it. (Here are Part One and Part Two if you missed 'em).

Does this captured moment make you wanna investigate any of these 20 films?

Oh, and there's a murderer in the woods, so stay close.

FIRST COW  (Kelly Reichardt, US)
A24. Original release date: March 6th, 2020. Streaming on Showtime

I must confess that I have never jumped on the Kelly Reichardt bandwagon. Other than Wendy & Lucy I haven't yet been blown away but this is on my list to catch up with. Especially after reading the pieces right here about it from Jason, Claudio, and Daniel. 

This is a total great piece. Absolutely.

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1987: Karen Allen in "The Glass Menagerie"

Each month before the Smackdown, Nick Taylor considers alternates to Oscar's ballot...

Remember way back when this Smackdown season started with 1981, and I mentioned Karen Allen as someone who somehow missed out on a well-deserved Supporting Actress nomination despite how few films Oscar bothered to recognize that year? Her barnstorming performance in Raiders of the Lost Ark is one of that adventure classic's secret weapons, building on the potential in Marion Ravenwood and delivering a tangible, electrifying character even when the script lets her down. In truth, I sometimes think of Allen alongside contemporaneous stars like Jessica Harper and Brooke Adams: singular, charismatic screen presences you could never mix up for one another despite their similar appearances, all of whom starred in some of the best, most idiosyncratic films of the ‘70s and ‘80s. 

I’d also wager that Harper and Adams’ personas would suggest themselves for the role of the shy, undemonstrative Laura Wingfield in Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie more than Allen’s would. Who’d pick Marion Ravenwood (!) for a part given to Jane Wyman in 1950? Yet it was Allen who played the role onstage opposite Joanne Woodward, John Sayles (!), and James Naughton at the Williamstown Theatre Festival in 1986, and Paul Newman was so impressed by their performances that he decided to make a damn movie...

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Ahead of "The Life Ahead," Actressing in Subtitles in the 2010s

by Juan Carlos Ojano

Cinema legend Sophia Loren makes a potential comeback with this year’s The Life Ahead this Friday on Netflix after more than a decade of career hiatus. Loren made history as the first Oscar winner for a performance not in the English language for 1961’s Italian film Two Women. Her second Best Actress nomination came with 1964’s Marriage Italian Style. If nominated for The Life Ahead, Loren would break the record for the longest gap between nominations with 56 years (though she'd only tie the record for most nominations for subtitled performances since her frequent co-star Marcello Mastroianni holds that record with three).

Loren is part of the longstanding tradition of Best Actress nominations for performances not in the English language (it happens far more often there than in other acting categories). Whether through sheer talent, strategic campaigning, and/or the dearth of quality roles for actresses in Hollywood, these performances overcame the one-inch barrier of subtitles and ended up with Academy recognition...

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The Furniture: Promoting the Forbidden City with The Last Emperor

"The Furniture," by Daniel Walber. (Click on the images for magnified detail)

The Last Emperor is enormous, as is its reputation. The shorter version is nearly three hours long. It swept the 1987 Oscars, winning all nine categories in which it was nominated. Its plot tracks events of global significance, across nearly six decades of Chinese history. The production required more than 10,000 costumes and 19,000 extras, many of them recruited from the People’s Liberation Army

But beyond its stature as a film, it is also something of an act of economic diplomacy. China, which had heavily restricted tourism before the late-1970s, began a major about-face with Deng Xiaoping’s 1978 “Reform and Opening Up” program.  Part of this effort included the promotion of heritage tourism. China ratified the World Heritage Convention in 1985, and added its first six World Heritage Sites in 1987. The Forbidden City was at the top of the list.

It’s not a coincidence that Bernardo Bertolucci was granted permission to film in the Forbidden City right at this time, the very first Western production allowed through the palace gates...

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Beauty Break: A Veteran's Day Gallery (and rant)

by Nathaniel R

George Clooney in "Three Kings"

Happy Veteran's Day to all reading who have served or have loved ones that have. I've been thinking more about the military than usual lately. That's probably partially because our Montgomery Clift centennial series featured so many military films. But it's especially due to the US election where there was a lot of discussion about mail-in voting which the military especially has been doing for hundreds of years (their votes generally arrives late due to absentee ballots). The military is not a monolithic voting block and contains Republicans, Democrats, and Independents.

After the jump please enjoy pictures of beautiful men in military movies and ignore the text if you can't stomach a political rant right now...

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