March. It's a Wrap

March was approximately a decade long but it has finally ended its interminable reign. Will April be as endless? Only the novel coronavirus knows. Here are a dozen blog highlights from the month that was...

March Highlights
• What if Sondheim's "Company" were a movie - Lynn ponders casting possibilites
• Top 100 Documentaries of the Decade - Glenn sees (and ranks) everything.
• The moment I fell for Kristen Stewart - Claudio looks at The Runaways (2010) for its 10th
• Lady in a Cage (1964) -Nathaniel gets in the elevator with Olivia de Havilland
• Never Rarely Sometimes Always -Murtada talks to director Eliza Hittman
• RIP Max Von Sydow -Nathaniel says farewell to a great
• Cate as Blue Jasmine - Murtada dives deep with special guests
• Deneuve in Repulsion - Jason minds the crack
• Emma and Cactus Flower - the podcast has returned
• Toshiro Mifune - a centennial celebration (the actual 100th is tomorrow - two more pieces coming)

Most Discussed
• Oscar Category Fraud Eric looks at the (screen percentage) numbers
• Not the Iron Lady - Claudio asks what should have been Meryl's Third?
• Daniel Day Lewis - the best three-time winner?

Toshiro Mifune @ 100: Yojimbo

Team Experience is celebrating the Centennial of Japan's great movie star Toshiro Mifune for the next couple of nights. Here's Eric Blume...

When the Akira Kurosawa film Yojimbo was released in 1961, he and Toshiro Mifune already had collaborated on over a dozen films, and this collaboration is widely considered one of their greatest.  It essentially birthed the character of The Man With No Name, was remade three years later by Hollywood as A Fistful of Dollars with Clint Eastwood, and has had an enduring influence on films for almost sixty years...

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Horror Actressing: Shelley Duvall in "The Shining"

by Jason Adams

Why isn't the face of "Cabin Fever" that of Shelley Duvall's? Why isn't it her Wendy Torrance huddled behind that bathroom door holding a knife that we see, instead of Jack Nicholson's Jack peering through the broken slats? I mean we all know the answer -- it rhymes with "Fuctural Fisogyny" -- but maybe we should start to do something about that. All of the news stories we've seen over the past few weeks about the victims of domestic abuse being quarantined at home with their abusers feels like a good start to having that conversation. Losing your mind trapped in a single location is scary, but being trapped in one place with a person you love who has lost theirs is scary tenfold.

For all of the abuse that Shelley Duvall suffered as an actress at the hands of her director Stanley Kubrick in the making of The Shining it feels just, and way overdue, to re-situate the film as that of Wendy Torrance's story of survival...

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You Will Be Linked

The Atlantic drive-in movie theaters are having a moment. Not that there are many of them around. 
Variety Anne Hathaway to star in the adaptation of the memoir French Children Don't Throw Food
The New Yorker "pandemics and the shape of history"
MNPP Dolly Parton will be reading to children every Thursday on YouTube
Variety in the land of stars getting creative during the shelter in place, Emilia Clarke is offering a virtual dinner for charity for coronavirus relief. You get to cook with her and eat with her if you're selected.
/Film Genius: Queen of Soul starring Cynthia Erivo as Aretha Franklin delayed til later this year (in related news Respect starring Jennifer Hudson is moving to 2021. I think we know who loses in an acting cage match between the two, even if they won't be competing at the same awards show.)
Boy Culture the last time various household name artists charted on the top 40
Coming Soon remember the days when Netflix never cancelled any of their shows? Those days are long gone. October Faction and V Wars are both cancelled after their first seasons (though Locke & Key gets to stay for a second round)
Deadline Sony moves all their big ticket 2020 movies to 2021 in one swoop. 
Deadline Oscar-nominated songwriter Adam Schlesinger ("That Thing You Do") of the band Fountains of Wayne in a medically induced coma due to coronavirus

Exit Music
James Corden gathered up Ben Platt and the current touring company of Dear Evan Hansen to sing "You Will Be Found". Lovely song. It starts around 2:30

Almost There: Ben Affleck in "Hollywoodland"

by Cláudio Alves

Ben Affleck may be one of Hollywood's A-listers, but he's not quite respected as an artist. More precisely, he's not often celebrated for being a performer, having otherwise received plenty of acclaim for his work as a director and producer. Just look at his awards history. He's gotten very little love for his acting skills but won two Academy Awards, for writing Good Will Hunting and for producing Argo. Had he been nominated for directing the latter, as it was widely expected, he'd probably have added another little golden man to his collection. It's difficult to feel bad for the fellow, but, at the same time, Affleck's reputation as a subpar actor isn't completely warranted. 

While it's true his range is narrow, when cast in the right role, Ben Affleck can be quite impressive. You'll find no better example of that than 2006's Hollywoodland…

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